Any Cardinal electors who have made the trip to Vatican City but take ill or are too frail to make it to the Sistine Chapel can take part in the voting process.
To do that, three Cardinal electors known as the Infirmary are chosen at random and tasked with leaving the Chapel to any unwell Cardinals there, they will collect those Cardinals’ votes in a box in a process carried out in meticulous details to avoid any suggestion of foul play.
Before they head over to the H – Shape Saint Marta House ( Casa Santa Marta) residence, which houses the Cardinal electors, three Infirmary must open the ballot box to show the other electors that it is empty. They will then lock the box and place its key on the altar.
Then, the Infirmary take the locked box and a paper on a small tray to the Casa Santa Marta. Each Cardinal elector takes the same oath as his fellow Cardinals, write his vote, folds it in half and pushes it through the opening in the box. If any eleectors are sick to write, one of the three Infirmary or another Cardinal nominated by the same procedure, having taken an oath of secrecy.
The three Infirmary Cardinals then take back the box to the Sistine Chapel, where it is opened by the Cardinals referred to as the Scrutineers – they announce and count the Conclave votes, count the ballots in the box and confirm that they correspond with number of sick Cardinals.
The votes are then treated like all the others, placed one by one on a plate that sits over an Urn used for the ballots and then tipped into the receptable.
