The first gal pal of France was hospitalized, officials said on Sunday, following reports that President Francois Hollande could be having a fling behind her back.
Hollande’s live-in girlfriend — 48-year-old journalist Valerie Trierweiler — has been in the hospital since Friday for “rest and a few tests,” her chief of staff Patrice Biancone confirmed.
Trierweiler is generally treated as France’s first lady, even though she and Hollande have never been married.
The magazine Closer published images Friday showing a bodyguard and a helmeted man, allegedly Hollande, paying a social call to actress Julie Gayet, 41.
Hollande, 59, is scheduled to have a press conference on Tuesday to announce various economic policy initiatives.
It’s now believed he’ll have to spend a chunk of that event, explaining his ties to – if any – Gayet.
President Hollande has threatened to sue Closer magazine, the same publication that raised eyebrows by publishing topless photos of the Duchess of Cambridge in 2012.
Hollande said he “greatly deplores the invasion of his privacy” by the magazine.
Closer reported that its pictures, snapped around the first of the year, show Hollande being taken to a love nest he and Gayet maintain near the presidential Elysee Palace.
Hollande had freshly-baked croissants delivered to the flat in the mornings by his personal bodyguards, according to the magazine.
The socialist, who took office in May 2012, has been suffering from slipping poll numbers. A poll in November pegged his public support at 15 percent, the lowest of any French president in a half-century.
But this alleged fling might not mean much to the bed-hopping French.
A poll by the Sunday newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche showed that 77 percent of respondents said any romantic issues of Hollande’s are his own personal concern, and of no interest to voters.
“In fact he is already so unpopular that this will not change anything,” Frederic Dabi of pollsters Ifop told the newspaper.