ROME—Former Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi was hospitalized Wednesday in intensive care because of a problem related to a previous infection, but was alert and speaking, Italy’s foreign minister said.
The 86-year-old three-time premier was in the ICU at Milan’s San Raffaele hospital, the clinic where he routinely receives care, said Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, who is also a leader of Berlusconi’s Forza Italia party. Speaking from Brussels, Tajani said Berlusconi was admitted because of an “unresolved problem” related to a previous infection.
Berlusconi has had a series of health problems in recent years, most significantly recovering from COVID-19 in 2020. He told reporters after being discharged from a 10-day hospital stay then that disease had been “insidious” and was the most dangerous challenge he had ever faced.
He has had a pacemaker for years, underwent heart surgery to replace an aortic valve in 2016, and has overcome prostate cancer. In January 2022 he was admitted for a reported urinary tract infection.
Berlusconi had been to San Raffaele, where his personal physician works, for a regular checkup for several days just last week. In a March 31 tweet after he returned home, Berlusconi thanked “all those who wanted to send a thought or sign of affection in these days.”
He said he was already back at work “ready and determined to commit myself as I’ve always done to the country I love.”
Berlusconi, a media mogul-turned politician, made his latest political comeback in September general elections, winning a Senate seat a decade after being banned from holding public office over a tax fraud conviction. That election brought a right-led government to power, with Berlusconi’s Forza Italia party a junior member of a government headed by Premier Giorgia Meloni.
Berlusconi remains at the helm of Forza Italia, the center-right party he created when he jumped into politics in the early 1990s, though the day-to-day running of the party has been left to underlings.
In January 2022, Berlusconi withdrew his name from consideration to be Italy’s president.
