Pope Leo XIV will be admitted to hospital on Tuesday afternoon for surgery to remove a lung nodule, Vatican spokesperson Matteo Bruni announced on Monday. The procedure is expected to take place at the Gemelli Hospital in Rome, which has a dedicated ward for treating popes.
Recovery is expected to last around a week. Doctors detected the lung nodule in its very early stages during recent health checks, a fact the Pope himself discussed during his Sunday prayer. The head of the Catholic Church is 71 years old.
A lung nodule is a small cluster of tissue in the lungs. Most such tissue changes are benign, but a small percentage may represent an early stage of lung cancer. Most small lung nodules do not cause symptoms and are discovered incidentally during scans for other health issues. Surgery is typically performed under general anaesthesia, with the patient breathing via a tube.
The Gemelli Hospital in Rome is located north of the Vatican and is the usual location for papal treatment. The Pope’s predecessor, Francis, spent several weeks there before his death last year, while John Paul II, who led the Catholic Church from 1978 until his death in 2005, was treated at the hospital nine times. On the top floor of the hospital is a special apartment for the Pope, accessible via a long corridor secured by Italian police and Vatican guards. Alongside the Pope’s room, the apartment reportedly includes a meeting room for medical staff, a kitchen, a bathroom, rest areas, and a small chapel.
The operation will be the first hospital treatment for the Pope since he was elected head of the Catholic Church, which comprises around 1.4 billion believers, on 8 May 2025. The Pope is expected to recover in time for a planned 11-day trip to Latin America from 6 to 17 November, during which he is due to visit Uruguay, Argentina, and Peru.
Leo XIV was born in Chicago as Robert Francis Prevost and is the first Pope from the United States.
