Late pope's physician denies John Paul refused nutritional support

Published: 2007-09-27

ROME (CNS) -- Pope John Paul II's personal physician has vehemently denied an Italian doctor's claim that the late pope refused nutritional support that would have prolonged his life. Dr. Renato Buzzonetti said Pope John Paul had a feeding tube inserted when he needed it in his final days and received an intravenous drip "right up until the end, without any interruption." He said the pope was never "without medical aid and assistance, as someone erroneously wants to insinuate." Dr. Lina Pavanelli, an Italian anesthesiologist who neither treated Pope John Paul nor had access to his medical records, argued that when doctors outfitted the pope with a feeding tube a few days before his death, it was too late to help him. She concluded that the pope himself must have refused such treatment earlier, and that as a result he suffered from a serious "nutritional deficit." She said she reached her conclusion on the basis of the pope's TV appearances, press reports and comments from the papal medical team. The allegation, first made in a magazine article, was repeated at a Rome press conference Sept. 26, where Pavanelli said the pope's treatment, or lack of it, constituted "a real act of euthanasia, according to the criteria established by the Catholic Church." The Vatican had no official comment.

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