(Sao Paulo) Doctors under Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, admitted to an emergency hospital in Sao Paulo on Monday on suspicion of intestinal obstruction, announced on Tuesday that he would not be operated on but remained hospitalized indefinitely.
Nine months before the presidential election, the 66-year-old head of state had to leave his vacation spot in the southern and seaside state of Santa Catarina overnight from Sunday to Monday to be transported to Sao Paulo and admitted to the Vila Nova Star Hospital.
This establishment announced in a statement that “the intestinal sub-occlusive state”, a partial obstruction of the transit of the president, “is resolved” and that “a surgical intervention is not necessary”.
Two tweets were published on the official account of the president, about the approval of a tax abatement for the importation of scientific material, a way to show that he remains in control of the country despite his hospitalization.
The evolution of Jair Bolsonaro’s condition “continues to be satisfactory” and he will begin a liquid diet as of Tuesday, the hospital said, adding that “no discharge date has been scheduled for this stage ”.
This is the same conservative treatment option chosen by the president’s doctors during his last hospitalization, for four days, in the same hospital and for the same condition, in July 2021.
The decision not to operate on Tuesday was made by surgeon Antonio Luiz Macedo, who interrupted his vacation in the Bahamas to examine the president overnight.
Since the stabbing attack of which he was the victim in September 2018, in the midst of the presidential election campaign, Jair Bolsonaro has suffered recurring abdominal alerts.
Stabbed in the intestine during a walkabout, he narrowly escaped death. The aftermath of this attack has punctuated his entire mandate and he has already been operated on four times on the abdomen since the end of 2018.
Jair Bolsonaro had been widely criticized during the end of the year celebrations for staying at his vacation spot in Santa Catarina instead of going to the state of Bahia, stricken by terrible floods.
The far-right president is entering his last year in office in a delicate position, with popularity ratings at an all-time low and polls showing him widely defeated in the October ballot by left-wing ex-president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva , Lula.
The economic context is also worrying, with soaring inflation and not very optimistic growth forecasts for 2022.