Pope Francis is showing “slight improvements” while recovering from life-threatening pneumonia, the Vatican said on Friday, hinting that the 88-year-old pontiff may appear this weekend for Angelus prayers.
The head of the Catholic Church spent five weeks in Rome’s Gemelli hospital before being discharged to his home in the Vatican on March 23, where doctors say he will need at least two months to recover.
A Vatican statement said the Pope showed “further slight improvements” in breathing, motor skills and voice, which had been damaged by pneumonia in both his slight lungs. Blood tests taken in recent days also showed a slight improvement, and oxygen consumption had “slightly decreased,” the statement also said.
Pope Francis has been discharged from Gemelli Hospital and is now recovering at St Martha’s House, where he has lived and worked for all the years of his pontificate. The course of rehabilitation is expected to take two months. When the pope was discharged, he had time to address the faithful, but spoke with great difficulty.
Nights and days in hospital Francis spends with nasal tubes. During the day, he does breathing exercises and regains motor skills. Doctors believe the pontiff’s contact with new pathogens is dangerous, so both his visitors, nurses and close staff, who do not have to make separate appointments with the pope, use masks.
Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin said that even on the worst days at Gemelli Hospital, the pontiff reviewed the documents handed to him. He received both Parolin himself and his deputy Archbishop Edgar Robinson Peña Parra. The Pope approved the appointments of bishops and the canonisation of new saints.
