The president of the Generalitat, , will leave the hospital this Friday after two weeks admitted to the Vall d’Hebron in Barcelona due to a very rare pubic infection. The head of the Government entered the emergency room on January 17 suffering from severe pain and loss of sensitivity and strength in his legs, but it was not until two days later that the medical team made the diagnosis: caused by the bacteria. Streptococcus dysgalactiae. After almost 15 days of antibiotic treatment and rehabilitation to recover the functionality of her legs, Illa will leave the hospital and continue the treatment prescribed through home hospitalization devices at home. During his convalescence, Catalonia has suffered, led by his right-hand man and advisor to the Presidency, Albert Dalmau.
According to Vall d’Hebron in a statement, Illa has had a “favorable evolution in recent days, both from a clinical, analytical and radiological point of view.” And that has allowed him to continue his convalescence at home. This afternoon, the hospital has called a press conference to report details about the president’s health.
What is already certain is that Illa will continue to recover at home from this very rare infectious condition – it barely accounts for 1% of all diagnosed osteoarticular infections – which has forced him to remain admitted to the hospital and undergo a regimen of intravenous antibiotic treatment for the last two weeks. This infection affects the bones, joints and muscles of the pubis and the causative microorganism, in his case, was Streptococcus dysgalactiae a common bacteria that is part of the digestive flora, skin and pharyngeal tract. Sometimes, this microbe can pass into the blood without causing damage, but if along the way it encounters some local inflammation – the pubic symphysis is a joint with many loads and there may be injuries that inflame the area – it can insert itself there and generate an infection. That is what has happened to the Catalan president.
The medical team’s predictions have been fulfilled. On Monday, January 19, when the hospital announced the diagnosis, the doctors who treated him already predicted that the president of the Generalitat would be hospitalized for at least two weeks to receive the intravenous antibiotic treatment that was prescribed in order to eliminate the bacteria and control the infection. During her convalescence at the Barcelona health center, Illa has also received rehabilitation sessions to recover motor strength in her legs and on Wednesday the 21st, the hospital revealed in a statement that her evolution was favorable and she was already getting out of bed.
In this time that the president has been admitted, Catalonia has experienced one of the biggest crises in its Rodalies network, with a railway accident in which a train driver died and there were constant outages and incidents throughout the last week. In charge of managing this crisis was Dalmau, who served as president. The law of president of the Generalitat explicitly establishes how a vacancy in the highest position of the Government must be resolved and confers its functions on the vice president or the councilor in cap, if there were. Since this is not the case, it was up to the person in charge of the Department of the Presidency to assume that role, which is Dalmau.
