MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Bolsonaro discharged from hospital, told to chew food properly

Anti-Bolsonarists hinted it might have all been a political move

Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro was discharged Wednesday from the São Paulo clinic where he was admitted early Monday due to recurrent abdominal pain after emergency surgery was ruled out.

Physicians determined the head of state was suffering from another intestinal obstruction, something he has been prone to since a 2018 stabbing during the electoral campaign and which has already led to four operations.

“Sign up now, thank you all,” Bolsonaro announced on social media, showing a photo in bed surrounded by his doctors at the Vila Nova Star Hospital. Bolsonaro made the announcement himself, dressed in a football jersey. Clinic authorities eventually issued an official statement.

Bolsonaro, 66, underwent four surgeries stemming from the abdominal stabbing he suffered during a 2018 campaign event.

“We instruct patients to chew well, avoid some foods, and we hope to keep the president that way for the next 20 or 30 years,” Doctor Antonio Luiz Macedo told reporters. Macedo has been treating Bolsonaro since the stabbing and performed all four ensuing surgeries.

Bolsonaro was also recommended to avoid intensive physical activity for a week, but he warned “life goes on,” although he vowed to try to follow all medical advise. “All my life I've been an athlete, in the Armed Forces, a parachutist, a diver. It's hard to stay still.“

Bolsonaro was stabbed in Minas Gerais by Adelio Bispo, a man deemed mentally unfit to stand trial and who has been since locked up in a federal maximum security prison in Campo Grande, Mato Grosso do Sul.

Anti-Bolsonarist groups have hinted the far right President, who trails leftwing leader Luiz Inácio Lula Da Silva by 20 points in most polls ahead of this year's October 2 presidential elections, might be resorting to his health as a tactic to draw whatever sympathy he gan get to shorten the gap. Asked about that possibility, Bolsonaro replied that ”that question is an attack on the doctors; it is not a political move.“

Bolsonaro was irritated at hints that the 2018 attack was a scene. ”There are pictures, the knife came in. Do you think it's fake?“ In 2018 the attack indeed gave him a popularity he did not have before to beat PT candidate Fernando Haddad.

According to two Federal Police investigations, Bispo acted on his own, driven by his psychiatric problems. He has not been allowed to grant press interviews while incarcerated, which has anything but fueled speculations as to his real mental state.

Bolsonaro has managed to open a new inquiry into his own case. But the officer in charge of the original investigation has been sent on an official assignment to the United States.

”There is no doubt that it was an attempted murder. Now there will be a new investigation and they managed to get on the phone with Adelio's lawyer. The investigation must reach important people, this did not come out of Adelio's head,“ Bolsonaro insisted during a press conference at the Vila Nova Star hospital.

Haddad has described Bolsonaro's stay at the private clinic as a ”convenient hospitalization,“ especially given the criticism he received for turning his back on the Bahia rainfall crisis, while sunbathing in Santa Catarina.

Bolsonaro explained he had felt bad after Sunday's lunch. ”I didn't chew the shrimp well,” he commented.