Pele to spend Christmas in hospital, as cancer ‘worsens’

Football legend Pele‘s cancer has advanced and now requires treatment for heart and kidney trouble, according to a medical report released on Wednesday.

The 82-year-old is under “elevated care” and will now spend Christmas at the Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein, his daughter Kely Nascimento later confirmed in an Instagram post.

“Our Christmas at home has been suspended,” she wrote. “We decided with the doctors that, for various reasons, it would be better for us to stay here with all the care that this new family at Einstein gives us.”

“We decided with the doctors that, for various reasons, it would be better for us to stay here,” she said, posting from Albert Einstein Israelite Hospital in Sao Paulo.

She added, “We, as always, thank you for all the love you show here in Brazil as well as around the world! Your love for him, your stories and your prayers are a HUGE comfort because we know we are not alone.”

Pele has been fighting colon cancer since his diagnosis in September 2021 and was hospitalised three weeks ago after Covid aggravated a respiratory infection.