Cardinal Burke is a fat old man who travels a lot. This is not an insult, just a plain statement of the obvious. Doctors have a joke that pneumonia is the old man's "friend." It means that pneumonia and other respiratory issues tend to follow the elderly. It's not surprise that he is ill but I hope that the reports that he is on a ventilator are not true. I can tell you that if you see a report that he's on the vent and talking then the reporter is either lying or knows nothing about life support. Nobody on a vent is talking. You are heavily sedated. A person on life support is obviously, seriously ill and weak and getting them strong enough to be weaned off the vent is very hard.
My uncle, Sonny Boy got pneumonia and a collapsed lung and needed the vent. He never was able to fully get off it.
Now since we are in the age of the great pandemic, pneumonia and flu seem to have vanished. Possibly untrained medical staff overdid it with the vents last year and quite likely killed a lot of people. Presumably due to trial and error they have recovered their knowledge of how to use the machine. God willing poor Burke will come out of this alright but IF he has pneumonia and/or Covid and IF he is on life support Cardinal Burke's situation is very poor. I hope that his family or whoever has power of attorney for him is strong and sharp witted.