Famed astrologer Walter Mercado hospitalized in Puerto Rico

Walter Mercado

By SARAH MORENO

smoreno@ElNuevoHerald.com

Famed astrologer Walter Mercado, who has millions of followers in Latin America, has been hospitalized in San Juan Puerto Rico with pneumonia.

According to relatives, a bad cold caused Mercado, who goes by the name Shanti Ananda, to collapse Saturday at a private event on at his home in Ponce, Puerto Rico.

“Walter is stable, connected to oxygen and on antibiotics,” said his personal assistant, Willy Acosta.

According to Acosta, the stress of completing 2012 astrological predictions for various publications during the last weeks of 2011 impacted Mercado’s health.

"On Saturday, he was very pale and fainted,” Acosta said. Mercado was first treated at a hospital in Ponce and on Tuesday was transferred by air ambulance to a San Juan hospital.

“He communicates with people, but has restricted visits," said Acosta, denying that the astrologer has suffered a heart attack.

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