 |
Chavez says he needs another operation in Cuba
The 57-year-old socialist president confirmed he traveled to Havana for the tests on Saturday. Rumors of the unannounced trip had prompted a flood of speculation among the opposition and supporters alike that he was at death’s door.
Chavez’s health is the wildcard ahead of an Oct. 7 presidential election, when he will seek a new six-year term. He has never given many details about his condition so the news he needs more surgery was bound to fuel doubts about his recovery. “There is no metastasis, just this small lesion in the same place where they removed the tumor,” the president said during a televised tour of a factory in his home state of Barinas.
“Because of the growing rumors, I’m obliged to give this information now ... it’s a small lesion, about 2 cm across, very clearly visible. This will need to be taken out, it needs more surgery, supposedly less complicated than before.”
During one of two lengthy phone calls to state TV later in the evening, Chavez said the operation would take place in Cuba.
“I’ll go to Havana. Everything is ready there, with the same doctors who operated on me before,” he said. “To do it here we would have had to implement things, elements. It is safer there for this type of operation.”
But he denied he was rushing back to Cuba: “All in due time. Tomorrow I’ll be working all day, preparing myself for the weekend. ... Unfortunately, I will not be able to continue at the same rate in the coming weeks.”
Chavez said no one should be alarmed by the news, and that he was in good physical shape for the challenge ahead. Donning a bright red hard hat to stroll around the factory, the president had joked with workers and looked to be in reasonable health. “No one can say if it [the lesion] is malignant, but there is a high probability because it is in the same place,” he said.
He had insisted he was completely recovered, although medical experts had said it was too soon to make such a call.
One cancer doctor in the United States told Reuters that with such little detail it was impossible to know his real condition, but that the latest turn of events did not look good.
“They have always played their cards close to their chest, so you never really know,” said the doctor, who has followed the case from afar but asked not to be named. “But a two centimeter lesion in the same space where he had cancer before means there is a high probability of malignancy. This is serious, very significant.”
One medical source close to the team treating Chavez in Venezuela said he had been suffering a tumor lysis, or cell breakdown, which carried symptoms including a high fever. Venezuela’s information minister had earlier denounced a report that Chavez had been rushed back to Havana for emergency treatment as part of a “dirty war by scum,” launched by the opposition ahead of the election.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| BÜLENT KENEŞ |  |
||
| What befell Niyazi-i Misri in the past is happening to Fethullah Gülen now | |||
| EKREM DUMANLI |  |
||
| When a call for fairness and reason finds acceptance | |||
| ŞAHİN ALPAY |  |
||
| Uludere, test case for democracy in Turkey | |||
| EMRE USLU |  |
||
| Are the Kurds mentally divorced from Turkey? | |||
| GÖKHAN BACIK |  |
||
| Erdoğan, Gül and Davutoğlu: the inner bargain on Turkish foreign policy | |||
| MARKAR ESAYAN |  |
||
| Taking lessons from previous experiences with the military | |||
| YAVUZ BAYDAR |  |
||
| Qualm | |||
| ÖMER TAŞPINAR |  |
||
| A new phase in Syria? | |||
| İHSAN DAĞI |  |
||
| Turkish foreign policy: Time for a re-evaluation | |||
| SEYFETTİN GÜRSEL |  |
||
| Poor-friendly economic growth and the AK Party | |||
| CHARLOTTE MCPHERSON |  |
||
| Missing women, missing opportunities | |||
| BERK ÇEKTİR |  |
||
| Changes to incentives for investment in Turkey | |||
| MERVE BÜŞRA ÖZTÜRK |  |
||
| The 1960 coup: a final test for democracy | |||
| AMANDA PAUL |  |
||
| Ukraine: a lost country | |||
| MÜMTAZER TÜRKÖNE |  |
||
| The 52nd anniversary of May 27 | |||
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
