Pope Francis continues to rest, do paperwork at hospital

21 Feb 2025

By Contributor

By Cindy Wooden

Pope Francis Hospitalised
Pope Francis blesses a newlywed couple expecting a child during his weekly general audience in the Paul VI Audience Hall at the Vatican on 12 February, 2025. Photo: CNS/Lola Gomez.

The morning after the Vatican confirmed Pope Francis has double pneumonia, the director of the Vatican Press Office said the Holy Father had a restful night at Rome’s Gemelli hospital.

Matteo Bruni, director of the Vatican press office, told reporters early Feb. 19 that the pope slept peacefully, woke up and had breakfast.

A CT scan on Monday 18 February “demonstrated the onset of bilateral pneumonia, which required additional drug therapy,” according to the previous evening’s medical bulletin.

Rome’s Gemelli hospital, where Pope Francis is being treated for a respiratory tract infection, is seen in the early evening on 15 February, 2025. Photo: CNS/Pablo Esparza.

The 88-year-old Holy Father’s history of lung problems and repeated bouts of bronchitis have resulted in “bronchiectasis,” a widening of the airways that makes a person more susceptible to infection, and “asthmatic bronchitis” which makes “therapeutic treatment more complex,” the bulletin had said.

Still, Pope Francis was reportedly getting out of bed each day, reading and doing some work. Although the doctors’ orders for “complete rest” meant he was not receiving visitors, his secretaries were at the hospital with him.

Most evenings at 7 pm he was making his regular phone call to Holy Family Parish in Gaza, where the priests and sisters on staff are giving shelter to hundreds of people.

Pope Francis hands candy to a child at the end of a meeting with members of the Spanish “Gaudium et Spes” Foundation at his residence, the Domus Sanctae Marthae, before checking into Rome’s Gemelli hospital on 14 February 2025, for tests and treatment of bronchitis. Photo: CNS/Vatican Media.

A source, who was not authorised to give details of the Holy Father’s medical condition, said Pope Francis’ heart is “holding up well” and that he has not needed a ventilator, oxygen mask or CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) machine.

The source also confirmed that a couple of days before Pope Francis agreed to be hospitalised, he had gone to Rome’s Gemelli Isola Hospital for tests. He has been an inpatient at the main Gemelli hospital since 14 February.