San Francisco Frontiers - Brazil's Lula leaves intensive care but stays in hospital

Lula, 79, "remains in the Hospital Sirio-Libanes, in Sao Paulo, under semi-intensive care," they said in a public medical update.

The update came after doctors performed emergency surgery on Tuesday to drill through Lula's skull to relieve pressure built up because of bleeding in protective intracranial membranes.

The injury was linked to a blow to the head Lula suffered in October, when he fell in a bathroom in his presidential residence.

A presidency official explained Friday that Lula was in the same room as before, but the "semi-intensive" medical regime meant he had monitoring at regular intervals, instead of around-the-clock as when he was under intensive care.

The medical update said Lula "remains lucid and engaged, is eating normally and is taking walks in the corridors."

The president's medical team has previously stressed that Lula's cognitive functions are "perfect" and he suffered no brain damage from the intracranial hemorrhage detected and operated on early this week.

He is expected to leave hospital early next week, and will be able to return to the capital Brasilia, the doctors have repeatedly said.

- Working from hospital -

Despite the doctors restricting visits to family members only and saying the president needed to rest, Lula has been sporadically carrying out some of his duties while convalescing.

He has been speaking with officials and signing documents electronically, ministers said.

Lula's vice president, Geraldo Alckmin, has been taking on some of the president's workload but the presidency has not officially tapped him to assume full presidential duties.

The latest medical emergency adds to a list of health problems Lula has suffered over the years, including treatment in 2011 for throat cancer, and a hip replacement operation last year.

On Thursday, doctors performed a follow-up procedure to the surgery by inserting a catheter to block blood flow going through an artery to the area of his head operated on, to minimize the risk of a hemorrhage reoccurring.

They also removed a medical drain that had been put in on Tuesday to remove blood from the problem area.

Lula's doctor, Roberto Kalil, said on Thursday there were no signs of any complications, and that the longer that persisted, the better for Lula's prognosis.

"Every week, every month plays in favor of a patient who has had a brain hemorrhage," he told a news conference.

The Brazilian president's medical emergency this week started when he complained Monday of a headache while in Brasilia.

An MRI scan found a hemorrhage between his brain and the dura mater membrane that protects it.

He was rushed to the Hospital Sirio-Libanes -- the country's top medical facility -- where doctors carried out a trepanation, involving drilling through his skull to relieve pressure.

After suffering his fall on October 19, Lula told an official from his Workers' Party that the accident had been "serious."

In the weeks following, the president skipped planned overseas trips. But from mid-November he resumed his active schedule, hosting a G20 summit in Rio and attending a Mercosur summit last week in Uruguay.

Lula took up his current mandate in January 2023 after beating the previous, far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, in a tightly fought 2022 election.

O.Green--SFF