Three countries in the American continent continue to top the list of nations with the most deaths from covid-19.
The United States, with more than 525,000; Brazil, with more than 265,000; and Mexico, with more than 190,000, surpass India, the United Kingdom and Italy, which occupy the following positions, according to data from Johns Hopkins University this Monday.
The countries of the region are making progress in their vaccination plans, while in Brazil cases are increasing unchecked. This is how the week of March 8 begins in terms of the coronavirus in Latin America.
Brazil reported more than 80,000 new cases of covid-19 in one day on Sunday; the largest increase in a single day in 2 months, according to the Ministry of Health.
On Wednesday, the country had recorded a record 1,910 deaths from coronavirus.
However, last week, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro told his supporters that if it were up to him, Brazil would never have any lockdown.
In addition, public and private ICUs are near or at maximum capacity across the country, with a third on the brink of collapse to more than 90% of capacity, according to federal and state data.
Brazil’s largest state, Sao Paulo, entered a two-week “red phase” of coronavirus restrictions at midnight on Saturday, meaning that all but essential businesses would remain closed for the period.
Chile seeks herd immunity by July 2021 3:16For its part, Chile advances as the country in the region that has applied the most vaccines to its population.
“We are working hard to achieve herd immunity and we hope to achieve it by the middle of the year, before the end of June,” said the president, Sebastián Piñera.
On Sunday, Piñera confirmed the donation of 20,000 doses of the Sinovac vaccine against the coronavirus for Ecuador and Paraguay, sent following an agreement within the framework of Prosur.
The president assured that the donations “will not influence the vaccination schedule” of Chile.
We have collaborated with 20 thousand doses of vaccines with Ecuador and Paraguay to accelerate the vaccination of their health personnel.
These solidarity contributions do not alter our Vaccination Program, which will allow us to reach the entire population at risk in March and target in June.
– Sebastian Piñera (@sebastianpinera) March 7, 2021
On the other hand, Mexico will begin to administer the Sinovac covid-19 vaccine, the country’s Foreign Secretary, Marcelo Ebrard, said on Friday.
“Good news: we received the Certificate of Analysis for the Sinovac vaccine. It can be applied from this weekend throughout the country, “said Ebrard on his Twitter account.
Sinovac will be the fourth vaccine to be administered in Mexico, as the country already uses Pfizer-BioNTech, AstraZenica, and Sputnik V.
As for Colombia, on Saturday a shipment with 958,000 vaccines against covid-19 from Sinovac arrived in Bogotá and on Sunday 547,880 more doses arrived from the Chinese laboratory.
In Peru, the president of the Council of Ministers, Violeta Bermúdez, rejected the report on the Sinopharm vaccine that the local television station Willax broadcast last Friday, in which it was argued that the results of the clinical trial in Peru would have yielded an efficacy of 33 % in the case of the Wuhan strain and 11.5% with the Beijing strain.
In Venezuela, the questioned president Nicolás Maduro reported two deaths associated with the Brazilian strain of covid-19.
“Of the 4 people infected in Caracas, two died yesterday … they were young people in their 40s and 50s,” Maduro said on Friday.
According to the official report, so far cases of this strain have been detected in Caracas, Miranda and Bolivar.
In addition, the pandemic has caused unprecedented poverty in Latin America.
According to the annual report of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), 22 million people joined the 209 million people living in poverty in the region in 2020.