VATICAN CITY (CNS) — The Vatican and Italy signed a formal “declaration of intent” to move the Vatican-owned Bambino Gesù pediatric hospital in Rome to the campus of a now-closed Italian hospital by 2030.
Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state, and Alfredo Mantovano, secretary of the Italian prime minister’s Council of Ministers, signed the declaration Feb. 8.
The hospital, currently on Rome’s Janiculum Hill next to the Pontifical North American College, would move several miles away to the site of the former Carlo Forlanini Hospital, which closed in 2015. Like the hospital at the current location, the new location would be given the status of “extraterritorial” Vatican property.
Mantovano told reporters that after construction and remodeling, the new location would give the hospital at least four times as much space for patient rooms, clinics, offices and research labs.
While moving the hospital involves solving some complex legal and economic issues, the Vatican and Italy share a desire to provide the best facilities “for children with serious illnesses, their families and the doctors who want to care for them and for research,” Montovano said, according to Vatican News.
