The family of Pelé say the Brazilian soccer legend is hospitalized with a respiratory infection caused by COVID-19 but he is expected to be discharged.
“It is very unfair for people to say he is in the end of his life, in palliative care. Guys, that’s not true.," Flavia Nascimento, Pelé's daughter, said during an interview on TV Globo. "Believe us. He is not in intensive care, he is in a regular bedroom. He is not in risk, he is in treatment.”
Pelé underwent surgery to remove a cancerous colon tumor in September 2021. Brazilian newspaper Folha de S.