Argentine soccer legend Diego Maradona was given sedatives to
curb alcohol cravings at a Buenos Aires hospital on Thursday and
doctors said heavy drinking was to blame for his latest health
crisis.
The 46-year-old, revered as one of the game's best players, has
battled with obesity and cocaine addiction, appearing overweight
and smoking cigars in recent photographs.
Maradona -- a national hero who led Argentina to World Cup
victory in 1986 -- was admitted to the private Guemes hospital late
on Wednesday after falling ill. His doctor said he would stay for
at least a week.
"He's out of danger and doing satisfactorily ... All the tests
are routine," medical director Hector Pezzella told reporters,
adding that Maradona's condition was not related to the use of
illegal drugs. "He's sedated ... due to alcohol abstinence."
He said Maradona had friends and his two daughters at his
bedside. Outside, fans wearing Argentina's national soccer shirt
and banners from Maradona's former club Boca Juniors gathered, some
shouting "Come on Diego, hang in there."
Maradona's personal physician, Dr. Alfredo Cahe, blamed his
patient's jet-set lifestyle, family problems and an addictive
personality for his fresh bout of health troubles, and said he had
tried to leave the hospital early on Thursday.
He said Maradona had swapped his addiction to cocaine for
alcohol. "It happened bit by bit, but that's what happened."
Maradona's hospital stay was a reminder of the repeated health
problems -- many drug-related --- he has faced since retiring from
the game in 1997.
Cahe said just this week that Maradona had put on weight and
smoked too many cigars, and was planning a trip to Switzerland to
get himself back in shape.
A stomach-stapling operation in 2005 helped Maradona shed 66
pounds (30 kg) and transformed the bloated and hefty figure that
plagued him after his playing days ended.
In 2000, Maradona was hospitalized with a severe heart problem
while on vacation in Uruguay and tested positive for cocaine before
undergoing drug rehabilitation in Cuba.
Four years later, he spent 10 days in intensive care with heart
and breathing problems and re-entered rehabilitation.
Maradona's doctor said this month that the star had an
"addictive type of personality," but he denied that he was using
cocaine again.
He was suspended for drugs while playing in Italy in 1991 and
kicked out of the 1994 World Cup after a dope test -- which he
blamed on a member of his coaching team buying the wrong medicine
off a supermarket shelf.
(China Daily via Reuters March 30, 2007)