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US Justice Ginsburg Released From Hospital After Brief Stay

US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has returned home and is said to be doing well following hospital treatment for a benign gallbladder condition.
Sputnik

"She is doing well and glad to be home," a SCOTUS spokesperson said on Wednesday, as reported by The Hill

The 87-year-old was taken to the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, on Tuesday and underwent a nonsurgical treatment for acute cholecystitis - a benign gallbladder condition. 

Doctors identified that a gallstone had blocked the justice's cystic duct and resulted in an infection. 

Ginsburg is expected to return to the Baltimore hospital over the next few weeks to have the gallstone removed without surgery. 

The justice's health has been brought into question over the past two years - particularly when Associate Justice of the SCOTUS Brett Kavanaugh was nominated for office by US President Donald Trump. This selection was Trump's second nomination, following the confirmation of Associate Justice of the SCOTUS Neil Gorsuch in February 2017. 

Ginsburg notably underwent surgery and took a hiatus from the SCOTUS in December 2018 to have cancerous nodules removed from her lungs. She then announced completion of radiation therapy in August 2019 for a cancerous tumor on her pancreas. The treatment required the justice to undergo a "three-week course of stereotactic ablative radiation therapy," just months after she had returned to work in February 2019.   

Ginsburg has also been treated for three broken ribs within this two-year period and was more recently hospitalized in late November 2019 after experiencing chills and a fever. She was later released from the facility after her symptoms abated. 

Ginsburg's death or retirement, the latter of which she has said will not occur during Trump's first term, would allow the president to nominate a third judge to the nine-member SCOTUS, giving the court a 6-3 conservative majority if his pick is confirmed. 

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