Pope Francis hurts his right arm after falling for the second time in just over a month

ROME — Pope Francis fell Thursday and hurt his right arm, the Vatican said, just weeks after another apparent fall resulted in a bad bruise on his chin.

Francis didn't break his arm, but a sling was put on as a precaution, the Vatican spokesman said in a statement

On Dec. 7, the pope whacked his chin on his nightstand in an apparent fall that resulted in a bad bruise.

The 88-year-old pope, who has battled health problems including long bouts of bronchitis, often has to use a wheelchair because of bad knees. He uses a walker or cane when moving around his apartment in the Vatican's Santa Marta hotel.

The Vatican said that Thursday's fall also occurred at Santa Marta, and the pope was later seen in audiences with his right arm in a sling. At one of the meetings, Francis apologetically offered his left hand for a handshake when he greeted the head of the U.N. fund for agricultural development, Alvaro Lario.

''This morning, due to a fall at the Casa Santa Marta, Pope Francis suffered a contusion to his right forearm, without fracture. The arm was immobilized as a precautionary measure,'' the statement said.

Speculation about Francis' health is a constant in Vatican circles, especially after Pope Benedict XVI broke 600 years of tradition and resigned from the papacy in 2013. Benedict's aides have attributed the decision to a nighttime fall that he suffered during a 2012 trip to Mexico, after which he determined he couldn't keep up with the globe-trotting demands of the papacy.

Francis has said that he has no plans to resign anytime soon, even if Benedict ''opened the door'' to the possibility. In his autobiography ''Hope'' released this week, Francis said that he hadn't considered resigning even when he had major intestinal surgery.

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