Pope Francis has fallen and hurt his arm just weeks after another apparent fall resulted in a bruise on his chin, the Vatican said.
Francis did not break his arm in the incident on Thursday but a sling was put on as a precaution, a spokesman said in a statement.
On December 7, he struck his chin on his nightstand in an apparent fall that resulted in a bad bruise.
The Vatican said Thursday’s fall also occurred at Santa Marta, and the pope was later seen in audiences with his right arm in a sling.
“This morning, due to a fall at Santa Marta House, Pope Francis suffered a contusion to his right forearm, without fracture. The arm was immobilised as a precautionary measure,” the statement said.
Speculation about Francis’s health is a constant in Vatican circles, especially after Pope Benedict XVI broke 600 years of tradition and resigned from the papacy in 2013.
Benedict’s aides have attributed the decision to a night-time fall that he suffered during a 2012 trip to Mexico, after which he determined he could not keep up with the globe-trotting demands of the papacy.
Francis has said, however, that he has no plans to resign, even if Benedict “opened the door” to the possibility.
In his autobiography Hope released this week, Francis said that he had not considered resigning even when he had major intestinal surgery.
