He Pope Francisco was discharged today after three days admitted by a bronchitis On leaving the Gemelli hospital in Rome, he wanted to demonstrate his good condition by getting out of the car with the help of a cane and sending a message: “I’m still alive.”

The pontiff, who was hospitalized on Wednesday due to bronchitis, left around 10:20 local time (9:20 GMT) from the Polyclinic sitting in the passenger seat of a small car, escorted by the police and security agents. But, when leaving the clinic, he stopped in front of a group of faithfulonlookers and journalists who greeted him and to whom he confessed how he has lived these days in which the world has followed his recovery from bronchitis that took him to the hospital.

“I only felt discomfort and I was not afraid, i’m still alive“, Francisco insisted to the journalists who asked him insistently, getting out of the vehicle on the side of the road, helped with a cane and always with a smile on his face. The pontiff had words of gratitude for the doctors and nurses who They have been treated these days at the Gemelli, where he was already in July 2021 for his colon operation, and he also praised the work of the journalists who have followed his state of health.

In these days admitted and convalescing, in an apartment for the exclusive use of the pontiffs since the time of John Paul II, Francisco has read the press, has prayed in the chapel and the day before yesterday had pizza for dinner with the health workers and their collaborators. Yesterday, he also visited the children in the neurosurgery and oncology unit, bringing them Easter eggs and other details, and he even came to baptize to one of them, little Miguel Ángel, a moment recorded by the Vatican cameras and which showed that the pope was walking and enjoying an apparent good condition.

“The most beautiful thing of these days has been the visit to the children,” the pontiff acknowledged as he left. Before returning to the vehicle, the Pope greeted and hugged a couple who lost their daughter last night and together they prayed in these moments of pain. Now Francis will arrive at the Vatican, at the Santa Marta House, the residence he chose in 2013 after his election, thus rejecting the historic apartment of the Apostolic Palace. And, as he himself advanced before the cameras, tomorrow he will preside over the Palm Sunday mass in Saint Peter’s Square, which opens the rites of Holy Week, although it will be presumably officiated by the cardinal Leonardo Sandri.