Pope Francis, feverish, canceled his program Friday morning

Europe 1 with AFP / Photo credit: VINCENZO PINTO / AFP 16:36 pm, May 26, 2023

Pope Francis, 86, canceled his appointments Friday morning due to a feverish state, the Vatican said amid regular concerns about the Argentine pontiff's health. "Due to a feverish state, Pope Francis did not receive in audience this morning," said Holy See spokesman Matteo Bruni, without specifying what the Argentine pope's planned program was in the morning. This announcement comes two months after the pope was hospitalized in Rome due to pneumonia, from which he had emerged after three days after a course of antibiotics.

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Jorge Bergoglio said Thursday in an interview with Spanish-language television Telemundo that the pneumonia was treated "in time." "If we had waited a few more hours, it would have been much worse," he said. As for his knee pain, which forces him to move around in a wheelchair or with a cane, he said he feels "much better". "Some days are more painful than others, like today, but that's part of recovery," he said. Asked about his health at the end of April, on his return from a trip to Hungary, the pope had announced his intention to continue traveling: he must go to Lisbon from August 2 to 6 for World Youth Day (WYD) and then to Marseille in September, as well as to Mongolia.

The head of the Catholic Church maintains a steady pace

The pope usually receives his interlocutors, associations, religious, heads of state, in the morning at the Vatican for official audiences during which he regularly delivers speeches, while his afternoons are devoted to work and private appointments. Despite his advanced age, the head of the Catholic Church maintains a steady pace in his appointments, sometimes receiving a dozen interlocutors in a morning. On Thursday, he addressed nuns, the Italian bishops' conference and a group of young people from the Scholas Occurrentes educational network.

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The health of Jorge Bergoglio, elected in 2013, regularly fuels speculation about the possibility of relinquishing his office and his succession. He has repeatedly said he would consider resigning, like his predecessor Benedict XVI, who died in December, if his health fails, but he said recently that this was not the case. In July 2021, the bishop of Rome had already been hospitalized for 10 days for a major colon operation. He claims to have kept "sequelae" of anesthesia, which pushed him to rule out knee surgery so far.

In an interview in January, Jorge Bergoglio said he again suffers from diverticulitis, an inflammation of the diverticula, hernias or pouches that form on the walls of the digestive system. The pope is constantly monitored by a team of caregivers, both in the Vatican and during his travels abroad. A precaution all the more necessary as he has behind him a long medical history: at 21, he had suffered from acute pleurisy and surgeons had proceeded to the partial removal of his right lung.