Pope Francis, 88, suffered two “acute respiratory insufficiency” episodes Monday, another setback in his recovery from double pneumonia.
The Vatican said the pope’s episodes were caused by “a significant accumulation of endobronchial mucus and resulting bronchospasm.”
Two bronchoscopies — when doctors use a bronchoscope to examine the windpipe and the lungs — were performed. By the afternoon, he was given noninvasive mechanical ventilation.
The Vatican said that Francis remained alert and oriented throughout treatment and that his prognosis “remains reserved.”
The pope had a good night's rest Sunday evening. Earlier Monday, he was described as stable and off mechanical ventilation, and he showed no sign of new infection after he suffered a respiratory crisis late last week.
He has been hospitalized since Feb. 14 at Rome's Gemelli Hospital.
Francis had spent all Sunday without using the noninvasive mechanical ventilation mask that pumps oxygen into his lungs, which he had to use after Friday’s coughing episode. Francis did continue to receive high-flow supplemental oxygen through a nasal tube.
Friday’s respiratory crisis sparked fears of a new lung infection because Francis inhaled some vomit. Doctors aspirated it and said they needed 24 to 48 hours to determine whether any new infection had taken hold.
On Sunday evening, they said Francis remained stable, with no fever or signs of an infection, indicating he had overcome the crisis. His prognosis remained guarded, however, meaning he wasn’t out of danger.
Francis also received a visit Sunday from the Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, and his chief of staff, Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, with whom he meets at least weekly when he is at the Vatican. The content of their talks wasn’t known.,
He again skipped his weekly noon blessing to avoid even a brief public appearance from the hospital. Instead, the Vatican distributed a message written by the pope from the 10th floor in which he thanked his doctors for their care and well-wishers for their prayers and prayed again for peace in Ukraine and elsewhere.
“From here, war appears even more absurd,” Francis said in the message, which he drafted in recent days. Francis said he was living his hospitalization as an experience of profound solidarity with people who are sick and suffering everywhere.
“I feel in my heart the ‘blessing’ that is hidden within frailty, because it is precisely in these moments that we learn even more to trust in the Lord,” Francis said in the text. “At the same time, I thank God for giving me the opportunity to share in body and spirit the condition of so many sick and suffering people.”
Francis, who had part of one lung removed as a young man, was admitted to Gemelli on Feb. 14 after his bronchitis worsened and turned into a complex pneumonia in both lungs.
On Sunday night at the Vatican, Cardinal Konrad Krajewski presided over the evening rosary prayer in St. Peter’s Square.
“Let us pray together with the entire church for the health of the Holy Father Francis,” said Krajewski, who is the pope’s personal Almoner, a centuries-old job of handing out alms. Francis has elevated the job to make it an extension of his personal charity.
CORRECTION (Mar. 3, 2025, 8:19 a.m. ET): A headline in a previous version of this article misspelled the pope's name. He is Francis, not Frances.
