Pope John Paul II
Pope John Paul II reigned as the 264th Pope of the Roman Catholic Church and Sovereign of the e of the Vatican City from 16 October 1978, until his death, almost 27 years later.
On 13 May 1981 John Paul II was shot and critically wounded by Mehmet Ali Ag(ca, a Turkish gunman, as he entered St. Peter’s Square to address an audience. He was rushed into the Vatican complex, then to the Gemelli Hospital, where Dr. Francesco Crucitti, a noted surgeon, had just arrived by police escort after hearing of the incident. The Pope had lost almost three-quarters of his blood, a near-exsanguination, despite the fact that the bullets missed his mesenteric artery and abdominal aorta. He underwent five hours of surgery to treat his massive blood loss and abdominal wounds.
John Paul II’s health suffered a major blow after the first failed assassination attempt. He went on to a full recovery, and sported an impressive physical condition throughout the 1980s. Starting about 1992, however, his health slowly declined. He rarely walked in public and began to suffer from an increasingly slurred speech and difficulty in hearing.
Most experts agreed that the frail pontiff suffered from Parkinson’s disease, although it wasn’t until 2003 that the Vatican finally confirmed it.