The Doctor's Advice

Juan Peron has always been his own best oracle, particularly about his place in history. Recently, however, soothsayers around the 77-year-old Caudillo have been making their own predictions, mostly about his health. Peron suffers from heart disease, they say, or polyps in the bladder, or an ulcerous intestine. What Peron and his physicians discuss in private about his health is disturbingly close to the rumors. Last week TIME obtained the following reconstruction of a recent conversation between Peron and Dr. Alberto Taiana, Peronist Minister of Health and Education, and Pedro Cossio, an eminent Argentine heart specialist:

Peron: Tell me the truth. As you know, I am not "a sick person," but "the sick person." I know I haven't too much rope left. I get tired. I am not the same as I was before. It is difficult for me to concentrate, I who used to work 30 hours a day!

Cossio: Well, General, the main thing is that you strictly follow the instructions we have recommended.

Peron: I am obedient. I know when I have to give orders and when I have to take them, and my taking orders isn't what matters. The important thing is that the country is in the balance. I have to make decisions. Come on, Taiana, what is going on with this old man?

Taiana: You are in a delicate state. But since you talk about the country, I must be frank. Your faculties might suffer a decline. And inasmuch as we know you are not going to take orders, that you are going to work, that it is impossible to control you, I think you must be prepared for this situation. [There will be] possible losses of memory, very intense fatigue. Your heart is strong but undergoing tremendous tension. Your polyps are also a problem.

Peron: All right, so there is very little rope left. When [will I die]?

Cossio and Taiana: No, no. It is not at all like that. You must take care of yourself. It might be years.

Peron: I know very well that that is not true. As long as a four-year presidency?

Taiana: That effort would rapidly reduce the possibility of your survival. As your friend and doctor, I must tell you that you must not take on the presidency and that you must cut down on the work you are doing now.

Did Peron take his doctors' advice to heart? With presidential elections little more than a month away (Sept. 23), he had delayed accepting his party's nomination and indeed had remarked that he had no wish to "begin a race with a broken leg." But at week's end, apparently deciding that he has more "rope" than his doctors contend, he accepted the nomination--and the certainty of winning by a landslide.

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