Pope has ‘mild’ flu but papal trip to Belgium and Luxembourg still on

Pope Francis is still expected to travel to Belgium and Luxembourg later this week as planned despite cancelling his scheduled meetings and audiences at the start of the week due to a “mild flu-like condition”.

In a 23 September statement, the Vatican announced that “due to a mild case of influenza, and as a precaution for the trip in the coming days, the papal audiences scheduled for today are cancelled”.

On the same day, Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni held a news briefing about the Pope’s forthcoming 26-29 September visit to Belgium and Luxembourg, giving no indication that the trip was at risk of being cancelled.

RELATED: Pope Francis faces a tough audience in Belgium – it could be his most daunting trip yet

Pope Francis, 87, has been in relatively good health this year and recently returned from a 12-day trip to Southeast Asia and Oceania – the longest of his papacy – completing a sprawling four-nation trip with stops in Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore.

Throughout the 2-13 September odyssey, the Pope appeared energetic and in good form overall; and since returning, he has carried out his regular schedule of meetings and events with no issues.

Last year, the elderly pontiff suffered several health scares, including two hospital stays – one for a serious bout of bronchitis and the other for surgery to repair an abdominal hernia.

He was also often forced to cancel audiences due to cold or flu-like conditions, or was forced to have aides read speeches for him due to breathlessness; the pontiff is missing part of one lung as a result of a serious case of pneumonia when he was a young Jesuit priest.

In December 2023, he was forced to cancel a trip to Dubai to attend a United Nations climate summit, due to a respiratory infection.

Pope Francis also suffers from chronic sciatica and from knee troubles that often confine him to a wheelchair or the use of a cane. He has also had surgery for cataracts.

Despite all that, this year the pontiff has shown remarkable resilience, making several day trips within Italy, including to Venice, Verona, Trieste and to Bari, where he attended a G7 meeting over the summer.

Currently Pope Francis has no other confirmed travel plans this year; rumours that he would attend the inaugural Mass for the reopening of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris on 8 December have been quashed.

Once he returns from Belgium and Luxembourg, he will preside over the 2-27 October closing session for his Synod of Bishops on Synodality, a multi-year global consultation process that will come to a close this year with a second Rome-based gathering.

While in Belgium and Luxembourg, Pope Francis will meet with national leaders and civil authorities in each country, as well as members of the local Catholic communities.

In Belgium, he will also hold meetings with the world of academia, meeting professors and students of both the Catholic University of Leuven and the Catholic University of Louvain – universities with close ties to theologians who played key roles in the Second Vatican Council, as well as with those associated with liberation theology.

Francis is also expected to hold private meetings with officials and leaders in the European Union who attend his official events, though a list of those encounters has not been released.

Bruni said that he would provide details on any private meetings the Pope is expected to make as that information becomes available, as well as any relevant updates on the Pope’s health.

RELATED: Belgian Catholic university accused of belittling Pope’s visit due to ‘militant left-wing’ ethos

Photo: Pope Francis greets a boy at the end of the weekly general audience at St Peter’s square in the Vatican, Vatican City State, 18 September 2024. (Photo by FILIPPO MONTEFORTE/AFP via Getty Images.)

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