Brazilian Bolsonaro is recovering but Reuters has no plans to leave the hospital

By Eduardo Simões

SAO PAULO (Reuters) – The health of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is “evolving in a good way”, but the right-wing leader, who was hospitalized this week after complications from a 2018 stab wound, has no time to leave the hospital, his doctors said on Thursday.

The president flew from the capital Brasilia to Sao Paulo on Wednesday for tests and emergency surgery to unblock the obstructed bowel after a few days of squeezing.

Bolsonaro, a former army captain, has been hospitalized several times after being stabbed to death by a stab wound to his gut. He also caught COVID-19 last year.

“Jair Messias Bolsonaro, who remains hospitalized at the Vila Nova Star Hospital in Sao Paulo, is developing in a proper clinical and laboratory manner,” the president’s doctors said in a statement, adding that they will continue non-surgical treatment.

“The president remains without a plan to leave the hospital,” the release added.

Bolsonaro’s son, Flavio, tweeted that his father was doing well and that he didn’t need surgery.

“President @Jairbolsonaro has evolved well, woke up in a good mood and if this continues, he won’t have to undergo surgery!” Federal Senator Flavio Bolsonaro wrote on Twitter.

Local G1 news reported that Bolsonaro was due to do more tests on Thursday.

On Wednesday, the president’s office said Bolsonaro, 66, could undergo emergency surgery after being taken from a hospital in Brasilia.

But after arriving in Sao Paulo on Wednesday night, doctors at Vila Nova Star Hospital said the president would initially remain “under conservative management.”

“I thank everyone for their support and prayers,” Bolsonaro said in a Facebook post (NASDAQ 🙂 on Wednesday, shortly after learning of the news of his transfer to Sao Paulo.

Along with the message, he shared a photo of his shirtless with his eyes closed and lying on a hospital bed covered with sensors and cables. Next to him was what looked like a priest with a cross.

POLITICAL PROFIT

The photos, along with a text railing against his left-wing opponents, led some to accuse Bolsonaro of using his situation to gain political gain. Many in Brazil believe the 2018 knife attack and the resulting sympathy were widespread when he won his election.

In an article in the Folha de S.Paulo newspaper, Bolsonaro’s hospitalization said he was given the opportunity to resurrect “one of his favorite people … a political martyr.” “Bolsonaro did not invent his state of health,” he said, but said the current situation is “immediately available” because it is “at one of the most serious moments of his tenure.”

Bolsonaro’s reputation has been undermined by handling the coronavirus pandemic, while senators are investigating a rather corruption scandal over the purchase of vaccines by his government. With more than 537,000 COVID-19 deaths, Brazil has the second largest death toll in the world after the virus in the United States.

However, a poll released by Datafolha on Thursday showed for the first time that a majority of Brazilians believe the country is “fully controlled” or “partially controlled”, a potential boost for Bolsonaro.