{"id":6470,"date":"2025-02-16T04:36:24","date_gmt":"2025-02-16T04:36:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-vm.com\/?p=6470"},"modified":"2025-02-16T04:36:24","modified_gmt":"2025-02-16T04:36:24","slug":"pope-francis-cancels-weekly-prayer-appearance-as-88-year-old-pontiff-remains-in-hospital-with-bronchitis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-vm.com\/?p=6470","title":{"rendered":"Pope Francis cancels weekly prayer appearance as 88-year-old Pontiff remains in hospital with bronchitis"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pope Francis<\/a><\/span>\u00a0has cancelled his weekly Sunday prayer appearance as the 88-year-old Pontiff remains in hospital receiving treatment for a respiratory tract infection.<\/p>\n

Francis was admitted to Rome’s Gemelli hospital on Friday morning having been suffering from bronchitis for over a week.<\/p>\n

In a statement, the Vatican confirmed the Pope’s absence from Sunday prayer and reiterated that Francis would remain under medical care for as long as necessary for his treatment to prove successful.<\/p>\n

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Providing an update on the 88-year-old, the Vatican stated the decision to rest had been made by his medical team ‘to facilitate his recovery’.<\/p>\n

The pope’s treatment on Saturday was ‘slightly modified based on further microbiological findings’, the statement added. ‘Today’s laboratory tests showed an improvement in some values.’<\/p>\n

Despite this apparent improvement in the Pontiff’s health, no firm release date has been muted.<\/p>\n

‘We will see how he reacts to treatment. I don’t have a precise date (for his release)’, said Matteo Bruni, director of the Vatican’s press office.<\/p>\n

A later updated provided by the Vatican added that Francis ‘did not show any fever’ today and that he had received Communion before ‘alternating his rest between prayer and reading’.<\/p>\n

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\"Pope<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Rome’s Gemelli Hospital, which is the city’s largest, is well known for having a special suite fitted for treating popes.<\/p>\n

This papal suite was often used in the past to treat the late Pope John Paul II during his 26-year papacy.<\/p>\n

Francis himself previously visited the ward back in June of 2023 when he was treated for an abdominal hernia.<\/p>\n

Outside the hospital, worshipers gathered at its statue of John Paul II to hold a communal prayer for Francis.<\/p>\n

‘We found out yesterday morning, with sadness,’ said Giovanni Di Muro, an Italian who was visiting his son in hospital. ‘We hope it’s nothing serious, and that everything will be fine.’<\/p>\n

Francis has endured a number of health problems over the last several years including influenza and abdominal surgery.<\/p>\n

He has also been suffering from a spate a lung infections brought about by the fact he underwent major lung surgery in his younger years after developing a case of pleurisy.<\/p>\n

This is the Pope’s fourth time in Gemelli Hospital’s papal suite, with the 88-year-old now using a wheelchair, walker or cane due to a number of recent falls.<\/p>\n

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\"Pope<\/div>\n
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Further signs of the Pontiff’s health struggles were noted last month when he was unable to read statements at several public events, with his aides instead reading out prepared remarks.<\/p>\n

Despite these recent health issues though, Francis had been keeping up with a frenetic workload since the turn of the New Year.<\/p>\n

Beginning at Christmas, he has had to hold Jubilee events every other weekend and also managed to pack his days with multiple private audiences.<\/p>\n

On Monday alone, he met separately with the Vatican ambassador to Croatia, a group of visiting bishops from Madagascar, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, a candidate to be the next UNESCO chief, the rector of the grand mosque of Paris and Nikas Safronov, a Russian painter.<\/p>\n

This weekend, Francis had been due to meet with artists and preside over a Jubilee audience for them at Rome’s famed Cinecitta studios, but this appearance has since been cancelled by the Vatican.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pope Francis\u00a0has cancelled his weekly Sunday prayer appearance as the 88-year-old Pontiff remains in hospital receiving treatment for a respiratory tract infection. Francis was admitted to Rome’s Gemelli hospital on Friday morning having been suffering from bronchitis for over a week. In a statement, the Vatican confirmed the Pope’s absence from Sunday prayer and reiterated…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6471,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"default","_kad_post_title":"default","_kad_post_layout":"default","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"default","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"default","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6470","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nPope Francis cancels weekly prayer appearance as 88-year-old Pontiff remains in hospital with bronchitis - VM News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/news-vm.com\/?p=6470\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Pope Francis cancels weekly prayer appearance as 88-year-old Pontiff remains in hospital with bronchitis - VM News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Pope Francis\u00a0has cancelled his weekly Sunday prayer appearance as the 88-year-old Pontiff remains in hospital receiving treatment for a respiratory tract infection. 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