Pope Francis is in critical condition after respiratory crisis but “continues to be alert,” the Vatican says

Pope Francis was in critical condition Saturday after he suffered a long asthmatic respiratory crisis that required high flows of oxygen, the Vatican said.

The 88-year-old Francis, who has been hospitalized for a week with a complex lung infection, also received blood transfusions after tests showed a condition associated with anemia, the Vatican said in a late update. Earlier in the day, the Vatican said that Francis had “rested well” overnight. 

“The Holy Father continues to be alert and spent the day in an armchair although in more pain than yesterday. At the moment the prognosis is reserved,” the statement said.

Doctors on Friday said the 88-year-old Francis is “not out of danger,” and that the main threat facing him would be the onset of sepsis, a serious infection of the blood that can occur as a complication of pneumonia.

“Sepsis, with his respiratory problems and his age, would be really difficult to get out of,” said Dr. Sergio Alfieri, the head of medicine and surgery at Rome’s Gemelli hospital, at a press conference on Friday. “The English say ‘knock on wood,’ we say ‘touch iron.’ Everyone touch what they want,” he said as he tapped the microphone. “But this is the real risk in these cases: that these germs pass to the bloodstream.”

In a brief earlier update on Saturday, Francis slept well overnight.  

The Vatican carried on with its Holy Year celebrations without the pope on Saturday.

Francis, who has chronic lung disease, was admitted to Gemelli hospital on Feb. 14 after a weeklong bout of bronchitis worsened.

Doctors first diagnosed the complex viral, bacterial and fungal respiratory tract infection and then the onset of pneumonia in both lungs. They prescribed “absolute rest” and a combination of cortisone and antibiotics, along with supplemental oxygen when he needs it.

Carboni, who along with Francis’ personal nurse Massimiliano Strappetti organized care for him at the Vatican, acknowledged he had insisted on staying at the Vatican to work, even after he was sick, “because of institutional and private commitments.” He was cared for by a cardiologist and infectious specialist in addition to his personal medical team before being hospitalized.

Deacons, meanwhile, were gathering at the Vatican for their special Jubilee weekend. Francis got sick at the start of the Vatican’s Holy Year, the once-every-quarter-century celebration of Catholicism. This weekend, Francis was supposed to have celebrated deacons, a ministry in the church that precedes ordination to the priesthood.

In his place, the Holy Year organizer will celebrate Sunday’s Mass, the Vatican said. And for the second weekend in a row, Francis was expected to skip his traditional Sunday noon blessing, which he could have delivered from Gemelli if he were up to it.

“Look, even though he’s not (physically) here, we know he’s here,” said Luis Arnaldo Lopez Quirindongo, a deacon from Ponce, Puerto Rico who was at the Vatican on Saturday for the Jubilee celebration. “He’s recovering, but he’s in our hearts and is accompanying us because our prayers and his go together.”

Beyond that, doctors have said Francis’ recovery will take time and that regardless he will still have to live with his chronic respiratory problems back at the Vatican.

As his hospital stay drags on, some of Francis’ cardinals have begun responding to the obvious question: whether Francis might resign if he becomes irreversibly sick and unable to carry on. Francis has said he would consider it, after Pope Benedict XVI “opened the door” to popes retiring, but has shown no signs of stepping down and in fact has asserted recently that the job of pope is for life.