Still 'Unstable,' Nelson Mandela Leaves Hospital

Nelson Mandela was discharged from the hospital today while still in critical condition and was driven in an ambulance to his Johannesburg home, which has been set up to provide intensive care, South Africa's presidency said. On a sunny but cold morning, an ambulance took the anti-apartheid leader home from the Pretoria hospital, where he had been since June 8 for what the government has described as a recurring lung infection. President Jacob Zuma said in a statement today that Mandela's condition "is at times unstable."

"His home has been reconfigured to allow him to receive intensive care there," the statement said. "The health care personnel providing care at his home are the very same who provided care to him in hospital. If there are health conditions that warrant another admission to hospital in future, this will be done." There has been an outpouring of concern in South Africa and around the world for the transformative figure who led the tense shift from white rule to democracy two decades ago in a spirit of reconciliation. Mandela turned 95 on July 18. (More Nelson Mandela stories.)