Chile adds more than 8,000 cases of coronavirus and authorities foresee improvement for May

The health authorities of Chile announced this Saturday that 8,124 new cases of coronavirus and 105 deaths in the last 24 hours, while projected a decrease in cases for mid-May.

“Taking into account this new quarantine, relatively short but very strong, and the massive vaccination, we hope that the figure will begin to decrease as of May 15,” said Health Minister Enrique Paris.

The country, with more than 1 million infections and 24,213 total deaths, has been experiencing the most critical moments of the entire health crisis for weeks, with a second wave that worsened after the summer holidays, and that has put against the ropes to the hospital system.

The ICU bed occupancy rate exceeds 95% and in the last 24 hours 3,139 people were admitted to units of this type, which implies that only 189 critical beds remain free throughout the country.

“We have strengthened the critical patient plan by increasing critical beds from 4,100 or 4,300 in the coming days, a great challenge considering the average admission of 89 patients a day,” explained the Undersecretary of Healthcare Networks, Alberto Dougnac.

Of the 8,124 new cases, 5,378 were symptomatic, 2,101 asymptomatic, and the rest were unreported, added Dougnac, and the positivity rate – number of positive PCR tests per 100 performed – was 10.6% after just over 73,000 were performed.

Neither the massive quarantines, which have confined more than 83% of the total population for two weeks, nor the rapid vaccination against covid-19 have managed to stop the drastic increase in infections in Chile.

The country carries out one of the fastest and most successful vaccination processes in the world, according to data from the University of Oxford, and since last February it has inoculated 7.3 million people with one dose and about two injections. 4.6 million.

However, in absolute terms, immunization has not succeeded in stopping infections for now, although it has served to reduce ICU admissions for older adults.

This Saturday, of the total number of people in the ICU, more than 30% were between 50 and 59 years old, while those over 70 years old (many of them already vaccinated with two doses) only represent 12% of the total.

Chile has been in a post-disaster state of emergency for more than a year, with a curfew from 9:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. and borders closed.