President after night in hospital: ‘Don’t get too excited just yet’
President Marcos, who was hospitalized on Wednesday evening due to an intestinal ailment, said the rumors of his death are “highly exaggerated” and told those eager to see him removed from office not to be too excited.
Following Palace press officer Claire Castro’s announcement of his hospitalization, Mr. Marcos said in a video statement released on Thursday that he was diagnosed with diverticulitis—an inflammation of the diverticula, or small pockets, in the colon.
The 68-year-old President then offered a piece of advice to people who wanted to see him out of Malacañang.
“Don’t get too excited just yet because it’s not a life-threatening condition,” he said.
Marcos assured the public that there was nothing to worry about regarding his health.
“Don’t worry. The rumors of my death are highly exaggerated,” he said, taking a line from American author Samuel Clemens, more popularly known as Mark Twain.
According to Mr. Marcos, he is now feeling well, far better than when he was hospitalized.
“I’m fine. I’m feeling very different from the way I was feeling before; the problem was fixed,” he said.
‘Common complaint’
“It’s a common complaint amongst, apparently, people who are heavily stressed and people who are, I have to admit, growing old,” he said.
The President was supposed to attend the awarding ceremony for The Outstanding Young Men 2025 at Malacañang on Thursday morning, but the Presidential Communications Office informed reporters on Wednesday evening that Executive Secretary Ralph Recto would attend the event on the President’s behalf.
He will no longer push through with his scheduled visit to Ilocos Norte on Friday, she added.
As the leader and highest official of the land, the President’s health is a major concern, especially with his history of donating one of his kidneys to his late father and namesake.
Imee’s revelation
When his own sister, Sen. Imee Marcos, publicly claimed during a rally of the Iglesia Ni Cristo in November 2025 that her brother was a drug user since his teens, Castro offered a denial by way of saying that there were reports that he would not have been qualified to donate his kidney had he not been healthy then.
Some of his supporters cite medical studies saying that he could not be a drug user because that could be fatal to a kidney donor.
News about his father’s kidney transplant surfaced in August 1983, shortly before the assassination of former Sen. Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr.
The late Juan Ponce Enrile, the minister of defense at that time, wrote in his 2012 memoir that Marcos Sr. had a kidney operation on Aug. 7, 1983, citing a Filipino doctor who treated him, and Imelda Marcos during a luncheon conversation at the Palace a week after the surgery.
Kidney rejected
It was reported, however, that the elder Marcos’ body rejected his son’s kidney barely a month after the operation.
A Vera Files report in 2021 said that Arturo Aruiza, the late strongman’s longtime military aide, said that transplant was the first of two and was performed by a select medical team led by Dr. Claver Ramos at the Philippine Kidney Center.
The kidney which, according to Aruiza, was donated by Marcos Jr., was rejected by his father’s body and removed 48 hours after the operation. —WITH A REPORT FROM INQUIRER RESEARCH
