MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Former Paraguayan President Lugo in ICU

Lugo showed slight symptoms during his trip to Colombia and had a second episode Wednesday

Former Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo has been hospitalized Wednesday in an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) after a stroke for which he remains under an induced coma, according to fellow leftwing Senator Jorge Querey, who is also the family's head physician.

Lugo, 71, was admitted to Asunción's San Roque Sanatorium “with the diagnosis of an ischemic stroke,” Querey told reporters. The former president was believed to have suffered an ischemic cerebrovascular accident (CVA). “That is to say, a small blood vessel in the back part of the brain occludes and blood stops reaching that part of the brain,” Querey explained.

Senator Querey, of Lugo's leftist Frente Guasu alliance, added that Lugo, who had just returned from Bogotá where he attended Gustavo Petro's inauguration, “had a convulsion or what people normally know as an epileptic seizure.” The episode, he said, took place after showing “very small symptoms” during his trip to Colombia.

Lugo underwent CAT scans and was due to undergo further tests to determine the magnitude of his case. “He is currently in a medically induced coma and connected to mechanical respiratory assistance,” added Querey, who estimated that he will remain in this condition for 12 to 24 hours to “adequately oxygenate” his brain.

Querey also said that Lugo is a “patient with a long-standing treatment” who receives permanent medication for coagulation and circulation. The former ruler was diagnosed in August 2010 with early-stage lymphoma cancer, for which he received treatment in Brazil and recovered in 2012.

“Today he had a second event, which we estimate by the studies that are in progress, he had a seizure, which is known as an epileptic seizure”, according to Querey.

Lugo, a former Catholic bishop, ended 61 straight years of Colorado Party hegemony with his electoral win back in 2008.