VATICAN CITY: Pope Leo XIV will leave the Rome hospital where he has been recovering from lung cancer surgery on Saturday after doctors deemed him "fit for discharge", the Vatican said.
Leo, 71, has been at Gemelli Hospital in Rome since Tuesday, when doctors removed part of his right lung to extract a cancerous tumour.
"Considering the blood tests, the chest X-ray done this morning, and evaluating the clinical picture, the Holy Father has been deemed fit for discharge," doctors Luigi Carbone and Stefano Margaritora wrote in a note published by the Vatican.
The Vatican said Pope Leo "will leave the hospital in the early afternoon and return to the Vatican. Tomorrow he will recite the Angelus prayer from the window of the papal apartment".
The Angelus prayer is typically delivered by the pope from the Apostolic Palace overlooking St Peter's Square.
But in previous years, former popes John Paul II and Francis, who were also hospitalised at Gemelli, delivered the prayer from the windows of their hospital rooms.
The Vatican press office said Leo celebrated mass on Saturday, as he has in recent days, in a room on the 10th floor of the hospital where he has been recovering.
Outside the hospital, 12-year-old Ukrainian Varvara Struck told AFP she was rooting for the pope.
The former cancer patient said she had met the pope last year in Rome, "and he blessed me for a successful treatment".
"With his support, I've now overcome my illness, and I want to give him my positive energy so that he, too, can overcome his illness as quickly as possible," she said.
Up in the air
News that the otherwise active pope had a cancerous tumour removed from his lung has rattled the Vatican and the world's 1.4 billion Catholics.
But his doctors have said Leo's recovery has been progressing normally as they await the results of tests that will determine the course of action to take.
Leo has resumed some work, making a call on Friday to Russian President Vladimir Putin to urge a ceasefire in the Russian-occupied Ukrainian city of Oleshky.
Up in the air, however, is a planned papal trip to South America, scheduled for November 6-17 to visit Uruguay, Argentina and Peru.
Vatican watchers say Leo — who spent two decades as a missionary in Peru — is anxious to make the long journey but will likely follow his doctors' recommendations.
Leo has cancelled all his audiences until Oct 20.
The pope announced to the public in St Peter's Square last Sunday, following the Angelus prayer, that a routine medical examination had revealed a nodule that doctors recommended should be removed.
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