Italy’s Berlusconi in hospital for routine check-up related to his blood cancer, no cause for ‘alarm’
- The 86-year-old billionaire media mogul is hospitalised for scheduled checks related to his blood cancer, doctors say
- Berlusconi was hospitalised in April with a lung infection, during which doctors revealed he had leukaemia but was not yet ‘acute’
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The 86-year-old billionaire media mogul “is currently hospitalised at the San Raffaele for scheduled checks related to” his blood cancer, his doctors said in a statement.
They said the tests had been brought forward, but added that was not due to any “critical situation or alarm”.
The senator, who dominated Italian politics for decades, spent a total of six weeks in hospital before being discharged on May 19.
At the time, he described it as a “distressing and difficult period”, but added: “After the darkness, I won again.”
Berlusconi’s right-wing Forza Italia party is part of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s governing coalition.
Matteo Salvini, head of the League, another coalition partner, said he had called Berlusconi after hearing of his admission, and they had “cracked a couple of football jokes together”.
Despite remaining president of Forza Italia, Berlusconi is rarely seen in public these days, and his health has long been a concern.
He was in hospital for 11 days for Covid-related pneumonia in September 2020, after contracting the virus while on holiday in Sardinia.
He described it as “perhaps the most difficult ordeal of my life”.
Berlusconi led Italy three times between 1994 and 2011 but has dominated public life for far longer, as a businessman and media magnate and through his ownership of the AC Milan football club.
His career has also been dogged by scandal and legal woes, which for the past decade were focused on proceedings relating to his notorious “Bunga Bunga” sex parties.
