Former president and now senator of Paraguay, Fernando Lugo, 71, had a stroke in his office on Wednesday (10), and is in a coma in a hospital in the country. His health condition is stable.
According to the doctor and Paraguayan senator Jorge Querey, a member of Lugo’s political coalition, the former president’s injury is “relatively minor”. The stroke was ischemic, a disease that leads to interruption of blood flow to the brain.
“Within the complexity, the situation is under control. If we don’t have a surprise, the prognosis is good”, he added, specifying that “the ex-president’s bleeding is small thanks to the drugs he takes”. Lugo arrived at the hospital in a wheelchair.
Doctors are expected to do an MRI scan in the next few hours to check the exact size of damage from the stroke. According to the Reuters news agency, the former president will be transferred to another hospital later this Wednesday. He must be in an induced coma until at least Thursday.
“We don’t know how these symptoms might behave in the future,” Querey warned.
Representative Esperanza MartÃnez told the press that Lugo had been feeling unwell since Monday (8), when he returned from Colombia, where he attended the inauguration ceremony of the country’s president, Gustavo Petro. “He is hypertensive and undergoing treatment,” she commented.
When president, Lugo was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma – a cancer that originates in the lymphatic system. He was treated in Brazil.
Lugo assumed power in the country in 2008, but was removed four years later by the Paraguayan Senate. At the time, parliamentarians accused the leftist of poor performance of his duties. The decision was contested by allies. Former President Lula, for example, called the process a coup.
Before entering politics, Lugo was a Catholic bishop. Upon being elected, he became the first president not to be a member of the right-wing Colorado party since 1954 – the beginning of the dictatorship of Alfredo Stroessner, a member of the party.
In recent years, he has frequently positioned himself on political issues in other South American countries. Last year, for example, on the eve of the September 7 demonstrations, fanned by President Jair Bolsonaro, Lugo signed a letter that considered the protests “an insurrection” that “will jeopardize democracy in Brazil”.
Months earlier, he was a signatory to the letter signed by South American leaders asking the Peruvian Justice to recognize the victory of leftist Pedro Castillo for the presidency.
