Bolivia registered 9,057 new positive cases and 37 deaths from covid-19, which brought the number of infections to 763,392 and the accumulated deaths to 20,291 since March 2020, in the midst of the fourth wave that is hitting the country.
Santa Cruz , the largest Bolivian region and the one hardest hit by the pandemic, reported the most new infections, with 2,718, followed by Cochabamba with 2,222, Chuquisaca with 1,205 and Tarija with 1,118, according to the latest report from the Ministry of Health.
La Paz registered 804 new infections and in the other four departments the figures ranged between 113 and 418, the report indicates.
Active cases are currently 138,455 and the accumulated number of recovered patients is 604,646, it adds.
According to health authorities, the fatality rate in this fourth wave is 0.6%.
The report also details that so far 5 million 494,299 people have received the first dose of anticovid-19 vaccines, another 3 million 962,684 the second and 994,936 were immunized with single-dose drugs.
In addition, 762,158 people over 18 years of age and people with underlying diseases have received third doses of vaccines as a booster.
According to the report, 642,393 adolescents between the ages of 12 and 17 received their first doses and 399,360 completed the vaccination schedule; while 452,495 children from 5 to 11 years old have been immunized with first doses and 103,662 with second ones.
Immunization began in Bolivia at the end of January 2021 in stages until it included children between 5 and 11 years of age from December, with a “vaccinable” population estimated at about 10.2 million people of the nearly 11 and a half million inhabitants that it has. the country.
Infections began to skyrocket in the last weeks of 2021 and the previous week daily records were recorded by exceeding 14,000 cases for three days in a row.
Since this day, the sale in the country of the antiviral molnupiravir for the treatment of covid-19 is authorized, the Ministry of Health recalled in a press release.
The drug “is approved as a therapy for mild and/or moderate patients who contracted covid-19” and “for no reason can it be considered” that it “replaces the preventive effect generated by vaccines,” the statement highlights.