 MADRID (Reuters) - A Spanish surgeon who has just examined Cuban leader Fidel Castro said on Tuesday he is making a good recovery from intestinal surgery, does not have cancer, and could return to governing his country.
| And I shall re-grow a head of hair and become lean and tough enough to join the Marines. |
Castro's disappearance from the public eye after emergency surgery for intestinal bleeding in July sparked frenzied speculation about his state of health but surgeon Jose Luis Garcia Sabrido said the communist leader was in good condition.
| All that great, free, excellent medical care in Havana and El Jefe has to bring in a ringer from Europe. Next thing you know they'll be flying him to the Cleveland Clinic. |
"His physical activity is excellent, his intellectual activity intact, I'd say fantastic, he's recovering from his previous operation," Sabrido, head of surgery at Madrid's Gregorio Maranon public hospital, told a news conference after returning from Cuba. "
| Because even thugs and dictators have the right to great medical care. |
He asks every day to return to work, but doctors advise him not to, to take it easy," said Sabrido.
| Asks to return to work? Guys like Castro are the same: if they're conscious they're working. |
Garcia Sabrido, who flew to Cuba last week to examine the 80-year-old leader, said he did not need further surgery but required bloodletting, physical therapy, a strict diet and leeches rest.
 "He does not have cancer, he has a problem with his digestive system," Garcia Sabrido told Reuters after the news conference. "President Castro has no malign inflammation, it's a benign process in which he has had a series of complications."
| Assuming for the moment that any of this is true, it might suggest that Castro had diverticulitis, an inflammation of a pouch of the colon. Complications could include bleeding, perforation and sepsis. Since he's an old goat he could have quite a time trying to recover. |
The prognosis confirmed the official Cuban line that Castro does not have cancer and is recovering from emergency surgery.
| And good luck trying to confirm otherwise. |
After Castro's disappearance from the public eye, U.S. intelligence chief John Negroponte told the Washington Post on December 15 that Castro was likely to die within months.
| I'm counting the days ... |
Garcia Sabrido said Castro could govern Cuba again. "Yes, when pigs fly if his recovery is complete, yes," said Garcia Sabrido, a digestive system specialist who knows the Castro family and has been a regular visitor to Cuba over recent years for medical conferences and to provide treatment.
Ah-ha. Regular visitor is he? Just vacationing in the sun with rum punch and hookers Cuban babes? Coincidentially being called to minister to El Jefe? Why's he providing treatment in the socialist paradise where health care is free and worth every penny? |
Garcia Sabrido said it was the first time he had treated Castro, and he did not plan to return to Cuba in the near future as he didn't want to leave fingerprints the leader had an excellent medical team.
More from the BBC:
A Madrid health official said a top surgeon, Dr Jose Luis Garcia Sabrido, had gone there in response to Cuban requests for help. Dr Garcia is an expert on intestinal ailments, particularly cancer.
Although Mr Castro's health is a state secret, Cuban officials have said that he is not suffering from cancer or any terminal illness, and that he is recuperating.
| He just can't come out and play today. Or tomorrow. |
The Madrid health official, Manuel Lamela, said Spain had been sending medicines to Cuba since June.
| Right about the time Castro began the big slide. |
On Sunday the Barcelona-based newspaper El Periodico reported that Dr Garcia had flown to Havana on Thursday on a jet chartered by the Cuban government.
| No urgency, though, they could have flown him in on Air Ukraine. It's always routine to fly foreign docs into a socialist paradise with free health care. |
Dr Garcia is understood to have been in Havana just last month - on that occasion to take part in an international conference on surgery.
| Makes for a good cover story. |
According to the programme for the event, he gave two lectures. One was on peritoneal cancer - a cancer of the lining of the abdomen. The other was on colonic cancer.
| Neither of which El Jefe has, nope, nope, not a chance. |
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