The condition of the head of the Pentagon hospitalized with oncology is named

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin remains in the hospital and is in good condition, the Pentagon said. In a previous statement, the military chief said he was recovering and looked forward to returning to work soon.

Seventy-year-old Lloyd Austin was hospitalized at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Maryland on December 22 with prostate cancer, recalls Sky News.

He returned to the hospital on January 1 due to complications including a urinary tract infection and has remained there ever since.

Pentagon press secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said in a statement, “He is in contact with his senior leadership and has full access to essential secure communications capabilities and continues to monitor the Department of Defense’s day-to-day operations around the world.”

Meanwhile, the hospitalization of the Pentagon chief caused a powerful political scandal in Washington. Last week, it was revealed that President Joe Biden and senior members of his administration were unaware that Secretary Austin was in the hospital.

The Pentagon did not inform the White House National Security Council or chief adviser Jake Sullivan about the hospitalization of the head of the US Department of Defense until Thursday, January 4.

And President Joe Biden was informed about this only that evening, recalls Sky News.

The US secretary of defense sits just below the president at the very top of the US military’s command hierarchy, and his duties require him to be ready at a moment’s notice to respond to any national security crisis.

This whole story with the hospitalization of the head of the Pentagon is unfolding against the backdrop of the United States carrying out airstrikes on targets associated with the Houthis in Yemen for two nights in a row. Dozens of targets were attacked in retaliation for Iranian-backed forces over months of attacks on shipping in the Red Sea, Sky News notes.

According to The Washington Press, back on January 1, President Biden joined his top national security aides in a secret call to discuss the upheaval threatening to engulf the Middle East and, most importantly that day, find ways to increase pressure on Houthi militants in Yemen, whose attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea have threatened global trade.

No one on the call, which also included National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other senior aides, noticed anything unusual about Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, an intensely private retired Army general known for his low-key style and loyalty to the president. Like other officials working remotely during the holidays, Austin called from his home in Northern Virginia. White House officials expected to see him later this week at a promotion ceremony.

Hours later, Austin was instead racing through the Washington suburbs in an ambulance, accompanied by his security detail. Suffering from nausea and severe abdominal pain, the 70-year-old man was admitted to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Maryland, where doctors began immediate treatment for complications from earlier surgery…

Not even Austin’s most senior Pentagon aides, top White House officials or Biden himself had any idea of ​​his whereabouts or the threats to his health. Kathleen Hicks, Pentagon Chief No. 2, who could replace Austin if necessary, was vacationing in the Caribbean.

It was four days before Austin’s medical crisis became public. The uproar over news that the Pentagon chief underwent two hospitalizations and surgery after being diagnosed with prostate cancer without notifying the White House or Pentagon officials threatened to overshadow his tenure as head of America’s sprawling military enterprise and created a potentially damaging distraction for Biden as he is stepping up his re-election campaign. It simultaneously sparked debate about the proper balance between privacy and disclosure for top government officials and what rights, if any, they have to keep serious medical issues to themselves.

Current and former colleagues said Austin’s natural introversion and his instinct, honed by decades of military service, to silently deal with personal problems may have led him astray.”