AP, file

Graca Machel, wife of former president Nelson Mandela, pictured last week, issued a statement thanking people in South Africa and the world for their messages of support for her husband.

Nelson Mandela’s wife Graca Machel thanked the world Monday for messages of support for her husband as he continued to be treated for a lung infection in hospital.

In a statement, Machel said that “so much love and generosity from South Africans, Africans across the continent, and thousands more from across the world, have come our way to lighten the burden of anxiety; bringing us love, comfort and hope.”

“The messages have come by letter, by SMS, by phone, by twitter, by Facebook, by email, cards, flowers and the human voice, in particular the voices of children in schools or singing outside our home,” she said. “We have felt the closeness of the world and the deepest meaning of strength and peace.”

Slideshow: Nelson Mandela: A revolutionary's life

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“Our gratitude is difficult to express. But the love and peace we feel give yet more life to the simple ‘Thank you!’” she added.

Machel quoted Mandela, 94, as saying “what counts in life is not the mere fact that we have lived. It is what difference we have made in the lives of others.”

She said that she thought of his words “on each occasion the world stood with him, making a difference to him, in his healing.”

South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma said on Sunday that the anti-apartheid icon remained in a serious condition in a hospital in Pretoria but added “we are grateful that he continues to get better.”

He has been in the hospital for a week – the fourth time he has been admitted since December.

Mandela's repeated bouts of illness have reinforced a creeping realization among South Africa's 53 million people that they will one day have to say goodbye to their first black president.

Mandela, popularly known by his clan name “Madiba,” has a history of lung problems dating back to his time at the windswept Robben Island prison camp near Cape Town.

He was released from prison in 1990 after 27 years behind bars and was president from 1994 to 1999.

NBC News's Rohit Kachroo and Reuters contributed to this report.

Related:

• South Africans fret about post-Mandela civil strife
• Mandela's visible legacy: South Africa's interracial couples no longer need to hide
• From the archives: June 12, 1964 - Mandela sentenced to life behind bars

Alexander Joe / AFP - Getty Images

Members of the congregation at the Regina Mundi church in Soweto, a flashpoint during the anti-apartheid struggle, pray on Sunday for former South African President Nelson Mandela.

LONDON -- Anti-apartheid hero Nelson Mandela is making “sustained” improvement in  South Africa hospital but is still in a serious condition as he recovers from a lung infection, President Jacob Zuma said on Sunday.

In a speech marking the 1976 Soweto youth uprisings against apartheid, Zuma invited his audience to wish the 94-year-old former leader “a very happy Father’s Day.”

In his remarks, posted on the government’s Web site, he referred to ailing Mandela by his clan name, Madiba.

“Let me at this juncture, invite you all to keep Madiba in our thoughts and prayers. As you are aware, President Nelson Mandela is still in hospital in Pretoria.

“We are grateful that he continues to get better.

“Over the last two days, although he remains serious, his doctors have stated that his improvement has been sustained. He continues to engage with family.

“I invite you to join me today, in wishing Madiba a very happy Father’s Day today. We love him and know that he loves us too."

It is the second time in less than four months that Mandela has been treated in hospital.

Related:

South Africans fret about post-Mandela civil strife

Mandela's visible legacy: South Africa's interracial couples no longer need to hide

From the archives: June 12, 1964 - Mandela sentenced to life behind bars

Naseer Ahmed / Reuters

A rescue worker and security official collect evidence at the site of a bomb blast in Quetta, Pakistan, June 15.

QUETTA, Pakistan -- Militants in western Pakistan bombed a bus carrying women university students on Saturday and then seized part of the hospital where survivors of the attack were taken, killing at least 12 people, officials said.

At least 19 were injured.

The gunmen in Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan province long plagued by sectarian violence, were holed up in the emergency ward of a hospital, engulfed in a firefight pitting militants against the security forces.

Television footage showed security forces surrounding the Bolan Medical Complex and a helicopter hovering overhead.

The attack in resource-rich Baluchistan was Pakistan's most lethal since the government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif took office last week.

The initial blast gutted the bus, killing 11 students, and another explosion went off soon after at the hospital, the city's largest. Television footage showed people fleeing the building in panic.

A senior local government official was killed in the hospital attack, the state television network reported.

Earlier, city police chief Mir Zubair Mehmood told Reuters that the students on the bus were from various ethnic groups, including the Hazara minority that has been the target of a series of bombings this year.

Slideshow: Pakistan: A nation in turmoil

Muhammed Muheisen / AP

Images of daily life, political pursuits, religious rites and deadly violence.

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Saturday's attack was the biggest since bombings in the city at the start of the year killed almost 200 people, briefly drawing global attention to a growing campaign of victimization of the Hazaras by sectarian militants.

It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the attack, or whether it was aimed at the Hazaras.

The 500,000-strong community in Quetta has been subjected to an escalating campaign of shootings and bombings by Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LEJ), a militant group dedicated to attacking Pakistan's Shiite Muslim minority, which includes the Hazaras.

Earlier in the day, suspected separatists killed a policeman and gutted an historic summer retreat used by Pakistan's founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah in a hill town in the province, days after a new government vowed to end a guerrilla war there.

Baluchistan, with large copper and gold deposits, is a vast province bordering Iran and Afghanistan. As well as sectarian violence, it has suffered a long-running armed independence movement, and what rights groups call a campaign of forced disappearances by security forces.

Related: Full Pakistan coverage on NBCNews.com

Slideshow: Nelson Mandela: A revolutionary's life

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View images of civil rights leader Nelson Mandela, who went from anti-apartheid activist to prisoner to South Africa's first black president.

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JOHANNESBURG -- South Africa and millions around the world on Sunday waited for news of anti-apartheid hero Nelson Mandela after he was rushed to the hospital with a lung infection on Saturday.

Officials described the 94-year-old's health as "serious," the first time the term has been used despite numerous health scares.

"His condition deteriorated to the point where it was found necessary to hospitalize him," said Mac Maharaj, South African presidential spokesman, on Saturday. "He is in a hospital in Pretoria now."

Many around the world were shocked by pictures of Mandela – affectionately known by his clan name Madiba – looking frail with current South African president Jacob Zuma in April.

Mandela's lungs have been weak since suffering tuberculosis while a political prisoner for 27 years under the apartheid regime. After he was released in 1990, he took his fight for racial equality right to the presidency, toppling the minority white leadership and becoming South Africa's first black president.

That he was able to help navigate the country through the time of monumental change without sparking a bloodbath as many predicted won him the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize and made him a hero around the world.

Officials tried to reassure the public in the wake of the latest hospitalization.

"The truth of the matter is a simple one. Madiba is a fighter and at his age, as long as he is fighting, he'll be fine," Maharaj said.

Nevertheless, South Africans worried and waited.

A news anchor on South African broadcaster ENCA told viewers on Saturday: "The Presidency has called on the people to pray for Madiba during his hospital stay."

And pray they did, with people gathering to pray in churches and parks.

"I'm praying, because he's a hero. I want him to be alive," said Sharon Dube in a Johannesburg park along with other well-wishers.

Others were quick to acknowledge the reality of his age and ailing health, and wished the father of modern South Africa well.

"We're praying for him. But we can't do anything. If the time comes, we wish for him a good way to go," said Noel Ngwenya.

It was not known what hospital he was being treated at, although officials and the family did say he was in Pretoria, one of the country’s three capital cities.

Indeed, journalists saw a group of people believed to be family members entering Medi-clinic Heart Hospital in Pretoria on Sunday.
Mandela's daughter, Makaziwe Mandela was also seen driving out of the hospital with his granddaughter, Ndileka Mandela.

In the past, Mandela’s family and the office of the presidency have gone to great lengths to keep secret the location of where he is being treated. 

Related stories:

• Mandela, 94, hospitalized in 'serious' condition with lung infection
• ANC defends broadcast of visit with ailing Nelson Mandela
• What will happen to the 'Rainbow Nation' once its icon Mandela dies?

Southern Cross Austereo via EPA

Radio presenter Michael Christian has been given an award by his employers despite a prank call involving a nurse who was later found dead.

An Australian radio host whose prank phone call to a British hospital treating Kate Middleton was linked to the subsequent death of a nurse has been given a “Next Top Jock” award by his employer.

AFP - Getty Images, file

Jacintha Saldanha, seen in an undated family photograph, was found dead after being hoaxed by an Australian radio show.

Michael Christian was one of two Sydney DJs who made the hoax call to the private King Edward VII hospital in London treating Prince William's pregnant wife last December.

Christian and co-host Mel Greig pretended to be Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles — and obtained information about Kate's closely watched pregnancy.

The nurse who put through their call, Jacintha Saldanha, 46, a mother of two, was later found dead in staff accommodation at the hospital.

Christian was given the award by Southern Cross Austereo, the same company he worked for when the prank took place.

The decision attracted criticism from an Australian government official, Communications Minister Stephen Conroy.

"I think there's a bit of bad taste involved there," Conroy told the 3AW radio station. "There was some very serious consequences of what was a prank and to be seen to be rewarding people so soon after such an event, I think is just in bad taste."

In a statement on Southern Cross Austereo's website, Christian said that “regardless of all that’s happened in the past few months I’m still at the top of my game.”

“From the start I felt like I had something to prove to myself,” he said.

In a section of the statement about advice to young people starting out in radio, Christian said that “regardless of what obstacles life throws at you NEVER give up.”

After Saldanha's death, Christian and Greig said in a statement that they were "shattered, gutted, heartbroken."

A formal inquiry into the circumstances of Saldanha’s death is due to be held in September at Westminster Coroner’s Court.

Greig told BBC News in April that she would give evidence at the hearing. She said she was "determined to answer any questions surrounding her role in these tragic events."

Related:

• DJs speak out, say they're 'heartbroken' over death of nurse in royal hoax call
• Radio station owner calls death of nurse who took royal prank call 'truly tragic'

Courtesy Save a Child's Heart

A Syrian woman sits at the bedside of her four-year-old daughter in the children's ward at the Wolfson hospital, south of Tel Aviv. The girl was brought to Israel for life-saving treatment with help from the non-profit group Save a Child's Heart.

The young girl was dying when she arrived in the land of her country’s enemy.

A heart condition had left the 4-year-old Syrian struggling to walk or even talk.

But in Israel – a country still in a state of cease-fire with Syria after the Yom Kippur War four decades ago -- she found her saviors.

Admitted earlier this month to the Wolfson Medical Center, south of Tel Aviv, she underwent life-saving surgery.

The girl is now recuperating on a ward along with children from the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Sudan, Romania, China and Israel.

"She would have definitely died if she wouldn’t have arrived here," Ilan Cohen, one of the doctors who treated her, said.

"A lot of patients arrive here from enemy countries and view Israelis as demons. They are surprised that we are human without horns on our heads," he added. "This is the first time they see Israelis without a uniform and I think it's a good surprise.”

Her treatment was the work of “Save a Child's Heart,” an Israeli nonprofit organization started by the late Ami Cohen, who moved to Israel from the United States in 1992.

He joined the staff of the Wolfson with a vision to mending children's hearts from around the world. The organization he began has since helped treat 3,200 children from 45 countries.

Save a Child's Heart also trains doctors from around the world so they can go back and treat patients locally.

"We have limited capacity and we can't treat the millions who need our help," Ilan Cohen said. "This is our most important task.”

Jim Hollander / EPA, file

Intensive care unit doctors Rahel Sion Sarid, right, and Eldar Schneider, wheel a Save a Child's Heart patient from surgery at the Wolfson Hospital, south of Tel Aviv, Israel.

Refugees in their own country – wracked by a brutal civil war between President Bashar Assad’s regime and opposition rebels for more than two years – the mother's and daughter’s journey to safety was a long and dangerous one.

They made their way to Israel through a third country, the name of which has not been made known for security reasons.

The child and her mother are also not being named because of a potentially hostile reaction should they eventually return home.

"It's just too dangerous," said Fatma Sarsour, Arabic translator for Save a Child's Heart.

"At some point, both daughter and mother will go back to Syria and they want to keep this trip a secret,” she said.

As recently as Tuesday, Syrian and Israeli troops exchanged fire on the cease-fire line on the Golan Heights. Israel has also sent its warplanes to bomb targets in Syria to prevent weapons getting through to Assad-allied Hezbollah militants in Lebanon.

Sansour said that when the girl arrived in Israel she was clearly “very sick.”

“It was hard for her walk or talk,” she said.

She was found to have only one functional ventricle – a type of chamber -- in her heart instead of the normal two.

In mid-May, she underwent a three-hour operation and she is now back on her feet and walking the hospital halls.

Her middle-aged mother appeared uncomfortable with media attention because of the perils of being identified and declined to comment.

But the girl is back to being a cute 4-year-old with a shy smile, despite the stitches on her chest.

She has been making friends with other children of various nationalities on the ward.

Alona Raucher-Shternfeld, a pediatric cardiologist with Save a Child's Heart who also helped treat the child, hopes this example of harmony between different nationalities and creeds can help inspire the wider world to better relations.

"We all hope that the co-existence that we created here in the clinic is a sign to what really can be achieved in the future.”

Related:

• Israel and Syria clash on Golan Heights cease-fire line
• Israel strikes Syrian military research center, US official says
• On the Brink: Syria chaos looms large over Obama's Israel trip

Thirty-eight people were killed by a fire that raged through an isolated psychiatric hospital north of Moscow on Friday, killing some patients in their beds and others who were trapped by barred windows.

Most of the patients died in their sleep inhaling the fumes as they were likely sedated by prescribed medicine, a police source told the RIA Novosti news agency.

Firefighters were delayed getting to the single-story building because of a closed river crossing. The trip took an hour instead of the expected 20 minutes, according to Russia Today, citing local news outlet Komsomolskaya Pravda.

A small tunnel was discovered dug out under the burned hospital, suggesting that one of the patients may have been planning an escape, Russia Today said.

Only three people - one nurse and two patients - escaped from the fire, which broke out at about 2 a.m. local time Friday (6 p.m. ET Thursday) in the village of Ramensky, 70 miles north of Moscow. 

Pavel Sergeyev / AP

Firefighters and authorities work at a site of a fire of a psychiatric hospital north of Moscow on Friday.

The blaze tore through a collection of wood and brick huts with bars on some windows that was home to people sectioned by Russian courts.

Russia’s Emergencies Ministry published a list of 41 patients and medical staff – ranging in age from 20 to 76 - who were inside the facility when the fire started [PDF link in Russian]. Two medical staff listed as “to be verified” are believed to be dead, Russia Today reported.

By mid morning, a few blackened walls were left standing, Reuters reported. The roof had caved in on top of the twisted metal of what were once beds. Bodies lay on nearby grass, covered with blankets. 

Irina Gumennaya, aide to the head of the chief investigative department of the Moscow region, dismissed suggestions they had been physically restrained as "rubbish" but promised blood tests to check whether there were high levels of sedatives. 

"The wards ... did not have doors, the sick could have escaped from the building by themselves," she said, according to Reuters, adding that she believed the most likely cause of the blaze was patients smoking, or perhaps a short circuit. 

Andrei Vorobyov, interim governor of the Moscow region, told Russia 24 television: "Those who were in there said it happened in a flash. The nurse opened the door to the room and there was smoke, and even when she saw the fire she could not get to the fire extinguisher. It all happened very quickly."

Reuters said more than 12,000 people were killed in fires in Russia in 2011 and more than 7,700 in the first nine months of 2012.

The per capita death rate from fires in Russia is much higher than in Western nations including the United States. Reuters reported:

AFP - Getty Images

A handout photo released by emergency services shows flames rising from the burning psychiatric hospital.

This story was originally published on Fri Apr 26, 2013 4:43 AM EDT

Ilan Godfrey/AFP/Getty Images

Desmond Tutu is awarded the 2013 Templeton Prize in this handout image

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa - Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, the South Africa anti-apartheid campaigner, checked into a Cape Town hospital Wednesday for treatment of a persistent infection.

Tutu, 81, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 for stance against whites-only rule in his country, and remained a global campaigner for peace and human rights until withdrawing from public life last year.

He spent the morning in his office before checking into hospital, a spokesman for his office said.

 “He was in good spirits and full of praise for the care he receives from an exceptional team of doctors,” the spokesman said.

He is expected to undergo tests to discover the underlying cause of the infection, and the non-surgical treatment is expected to take five days.

Earlier this month, Tutu was awarded the 2013 Templeton Prize worth $1.7 million for helping inspire people around the world by promoting forgiveness and justice.

He was a long-time campaigner for the release of Nelson Mandela, who was held as a political prisoner until 1990.

NBC News' Alastair Jamieson contributed to this report.

Related:

• PhotoBlog: Desmond Tutu's 80th birthday dance
• Desmond Tutu wins $1.7 million Templeton Prize

Slideshow: Nelson Mandela: A revolutionary's life

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JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- Former South African President Nelson Mandela is making "steady improvement" under treatment for pneumonia and doctors say he is much better now than when he was admitted to hospital a week ago, the government said on Wednesday.

The three-sentence statement from President Jacob Zuma's office was the most upbeat since the 94-year-old anti-apartheid hero was admitted to hospital with a recurrence of a lung infection.

"His doctors say he continues to respond satisfactorily to treatment and is much better now than when he was admitted to hospital on the 27th of March 2013," the statement said.

Doctors had drained excess fluid from Mandela's lungs and he was breathing without difficulty, the government said in a bulletin on Saturday.

It is the third health scare in four months for Mandela, who became South Africa's first black president in 1994 and was hailed as a global symbol of tolerance and harmony.

He was in a hospital briefly in early March for a checkup and was hospitalized in December for nearly three weeks with a lung infection after surgery to remove gallstones.

Mandela stepped down as president in 1999 and has not been politically active for a decade. But he is still revered at home and abroad for leading the struggle against apartheid rule and then championing racial reconciliation while in office.

Global figures such as U.S. President Barack Obama have sent get-well messages, and South Africans included him in Easter prayers over the weekend.

Mandela has a history of lung problems dating back to when he contracted tuberculosis as a political prisoner. He spent 27 years in prison on Robben Island and in other jails for his attempts to overthrow the white-minority government.

Related:

Mandela visited by family amid pneumonia treatment

Mandela in 'good spirits' in South Africa hospital

Mandela hospitalized again; world asked to pray for him

A 6-year-old girl -- shot and left for dead by the Taliban in Afghanistan earlier this year -- received free reconstructive surgery at a hospital in the U.S. Friday.

"She's OK. All is good, thank God!" said Elissa Montanti of the Global Medical Relief Fund.

The nonprofit children's organization, based on Staten Island, helped bring Marizeh to the U.S. after the attack that cost the girl her right eye.

Taliban fighters ambushed Marizeh's family as they drove home in a remote, unidentified region of Afghanistan last spring, said Montanti.

Her father tried to hide the girl under his feet inside the family car but she was shot in the face, after watching both her father and brother murdered.

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"They thought she had died. She was there for three hours before she was discovered," said Marizeh's doctor, Kaveh Alizadeh.

The plastic surgeon, who founded a nonprofit group that provides medical care to needy children, first heard Marizeh's story during a trip to Afghanistan.

On Friday, Alizadeh performed surgery on Marizeh at South Nassau Communities hospital on Long Island to help repair lingering damage to her breathing and facial structure. She had previously been fitted with a temporary prosthetic eye.

Malala, 14-year-old Pakistani girl shot by Taliban, can recover, UK doctors say

The medical care should have cost upwards of $100,000, Alizadeh said; but in this case, it was all done for free.

"To think about the trauma she’s been through and to see her come down and have a smile on her face, it’s unbelievable," said hospital chief operations officer Joseph LaMantia.

Marizeh is expected to leave the Oceanside hospital this weekend and return to the Global Medical Relief Fund's headquarters in Staten Island.

Thousands rally in Karachi for Malala, 14-year-old Pakistani girl shot by Taliban

It's unclear when she will go home to Afghanistan. Montanti declined to reveal Marizeh's last name or hometown, for fear the Taliban will target her again.

"If they know the Americans are helping them, it's dangerous. So we have to be cautious," Montanti said.

For all who helped Marizeh, it was a danger worth facing, to restore a little girl's smile.

"She is a very happy little girl, a lovely girl," Montanti said.