George Bush senior in intensive care unit Former US president George HW Bush was on liquid-only diet after a fever that kept him in the hospital over Christmas got worse. Photograph: Max Nash/AP Former US president George HW Bush was in the intensive care unit of a Houston hospital and in a "guarded condition," family spokesman Jim McGrath said on Wednesday. "The president is alert and conversing with medical staff, and is surrounded by family," McGrath said in a statement. McGrath said Bush snr, 88, was admitted to intensive care on Sunday at Methodist Hospital "following a series of setbacks including a persistent fever." Doctors were cautiously optimistic about his treatment, McGrath added. No other details about his medical condition were provided, but McGrath said Bush was surrounded by family. Earlier on Wednesday, McGrath said a fever that kept Bush in the hospital over Christmas had got worse and that doctors had put him on a liquids-only diet. A bronchitis-like cough initially brought Bush to the hospital in late November. Bush, the 41st American president and a Republican, took office in 1989 and served one term in the White House before losing to Bill Clinton in 1992. The father of former president George W Bush, he led the US into war with Iraq in 1991 in Operation Desert Storm. He also served as a congressman, ambassador to the United Nations, envoy to China, CIA director and vice-president for two terms under Ronald Reagan.