The agony of Hugo Chavez: details emerge of his final days

The agony of Hugo Chavez: details emerge of his final days
US-VENEZUELA-CHAVEZ-DEATH:The agony of Hugo Chavez: details emerge of
his final days
By Marianna Parraga

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela's Hugo Chavez slid into a coma the day
before he died of respiratory failure after cancer spread into his
lungs, sources say.

Chavez's precise condition was one of the world's best-kept secrets
since his cancer was announced in June 2011.

Since his death this week, however, details have emerged of the
58-year-old president's battle with cancer and the last moments in the
hospital with close family and senior aides.

"They used iPads and other tools to give him policy presentations," one
government source told Reuters, referring to ministers' visits to the
Havana and Caracas hospitals where he spent his final weeks, unable to
speak and breathing through a tube.

When appointing a new foreign minister, aides showed Chavez a list of
several possible names, and he put a tick mark beside one - Elias Jaua -
before signing the document, the source said.

After announcing in 2011 that cancer had been detected in his pelvic
area, and a "baseball-sized" tumor removed, Chavez insisted on extreme
privacy over the details of his health.

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That was one of the reasons he chose to be treated in Cuba, where his
friendship with past and present leaders Fidel and Raul Castro and the
ruling Communist Party's firm grip on information guaranteed him discretion.

Chavez spent several months there on various visits, and underwent four
operations, the last of which on December 11 was the most complicated.

His last words to aides before flying to Havana for that operation were:
"I'll be back for sure."

METASTASIS IN LUNGS

Chavez did, indeed, fly home, but in such a bad state he could not be
seen in public. He died of respiratory failure on Tuesday afternoon
after the cancer had metastasized into his lungs, two sources said.

During two initial operations in mid-2011, Chavez had a tumor removed
from his intestines, and was diagnosed with sarcoma in the psoas muscle
that runs from the lower part of the vertebral column to the pelvis, a
medical source said.

Though chemotherapy and radiotherapy kept the disease at bay and allowed
him to run for re-election in October 2012, Chavez took heavy doses of
medicines to enable him to make some heavily-staged campaign appearances
- in a lot of pain.

On the last day of campaigning, standing for hours under a heavy
rainfall, Chavez could bear it no longer, and a final rally was
canceled. After the October 7 win, by an impressive 11 percentage
points, an exhausted and suffering Chavez made few more public
appearances before returning to Cuba weeks later.

The December 11 operation lasted six hours and left Chavez in a dire
state, with hemorrhaging and a severe lung infection. He lost his pulse
several times during the surgery and had to be resuscitated by doctors.

Cuban medics designed a special antibiotic to counter the infection, the
medical source said, but even so Chavez had to undergo a tracheotomy to
enable him to breathe through a tube in the windpipe.

In his last few days, a heavily-dosed Chavez met only with his closest
family and aides despite a clamor from Venezuelan supporters - and
opponents - to see him.

Even one of his closest friends and allies, Bolivia's leftist leader Evo
Morales, was not allowed in to see him on visits to Caracas and Havana.

On Saturday, ministers were with him for about five hours, before a
rapid deterioration began. He slipped into a coma on Monday and died at
4:25 p.m. local time (2055 GMT) on Tuesday.

(Writing by Andrew Cawthorne; Editing by Simon Gardner and Kieran Murray)

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