The Pope’s doctor has said he found him in a coma with his eyes open, but that he died quickly and didn’t suffer undue pain.
Dr Sergio Alfieri said there was nothing that could have saved Francis, describing it as “one of those strokes that, in an hour, carries you away”.
Dr Alfieri headed up the team that treated the Pope during his recent stay in hospital due to double pneumonia.
He told Italy’s Corriere della Sera he was called at 5.30am on Monday and arrived at the Vatican 20 minutes later.
“I entered his rooms and he [Francis] had his eyes open,” he said.
“I ascertained that there were no respiratory problems. And then I tried to call his name, but he did not respond to me.
“He didn’t respond to stimuli, not even painful ones. In that moment I knew there was nothing more to do. He was in a coma.”
The Vatican said the Pope died from an unexpected stroke that led to a coma and irreversible heart failure.
He’s now lying in state with thousands queuing to see his open casket in St Peter’s Basilica before Saturday’s funeral.
Dr Alfieri, speaking separately to La Repubblica, said some officials had suggested moving the Pope immediately back to hospital but that he “would have died on the way”.
“Doing a CT scan we would have had a more exact diagnosis, but nothing more. It was one of those strokes that, in an hour, carries you away,” he said.
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The ‘Papal Interregnum’ explained
The 88-year-old Pope had been told to rest after his hospital stay of more than a month.
Dr Alfieri said despite him carrying out some duties, he had heeded advice not to push himself too much.
“Going back to work was part of the treatment and he never exposed himself to any danger,” he told Corriere della Sera.
Pope’s ‘last regret’
The doctor told the newspaper the last time he saw the Pope was Saturday, when he gave him some pie in a flavour he liked.
He described Francis telling him: “I am very well, I have started working again, and I like it.”
“We knew that he wanted to go home to be Pope up until the last moment,” said Dr Alfieri. “He didn’t let us down.”
He also told La Repubblica that the Pope had confided one regret – not being able to wash the feet of the prisoners he visited at a Rome jail on 17 April.
“He regretted he could not wash the feet of the prisoners,” said the doctor. “This time I couldn’t do it – was the last thing he said to me.”
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Prince William will represent the UK Royal Family at the funeral in two days’ time.
It will take place in the square in front of St Peter’s Basilica, but Francis will become the first pope to be buried outside the Vatican in more than a century when he’s laid to rest in Rome’s Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore.
Nine days of mourning will then begin before cardinals from all over the world lock themselves away in the Vatican to choose a new pope.
