Brazilian President Lula underwent successful hip surgery on Friday in Brasilia, but he will have to wait several weeks before resuming foreign travel, after a globe-trotting schedule since his return to power in January. “The operation went off without a hitch. He is already awake,” explained his personal doctor Roberto Kalil Filho, during a press conference of the medical team. He will return to a hospital room “in the coming hours,” “without the need for a semi-intensive care unit,” he added.
Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who will celebrate his 78th birthday in October, arrived in a presidential convoy at the Syrian-Lebanese hospital in the capital at 8 a.m. The surgical procedure, a complete hip replacement, began around noon and lasted a little over an hour, under general anesthesia, said the doctor, who indicated that the hospital discharge could take place “Monday , or at the latest Tuesday.” After fitting the prosthesis, the doctors “took advantage of Lula’s good response to anesthesia” to perform another procedure, cosmetic surgery, aimed at correcting the drooping eyelids.
On foot for COP-28
The former metalworker said earlier this week that he hoped the hip prosthesis would put an end to pain that was becoming unbearable and putting him “in a bad mood.” These pains, which he said began to appear more than a year ago, are due to osteoarthritis leading to deterioration of the cartilage in the joint of his right hip. Lula assured in advance that he would be able to “work normally” during his convalescence, even if he will initially have to govern the country from his official residence at the Alvorada Palace. He will be confined to Brasilia for at least four weeks.
A forced break for the former trade unionist, who has increased his travels since the start of his third term, in blatant contrast with his far-right predecessor Jair Bolsonaro, with his assumed isolationism. In recent weeks, Lula traveled to South Africa for the Brics summit, to India for the G20 summit and then to New York for the United Nations General Assembly. His doctor declared after the operation that he was “certain” that the head of state would be back on his feet in time to go to the UN COP-28 Climate Conference in Dubai at the end of November.