The coronavirus pandemic worsens in Chile despite its successful vaccination process

The authorities of Chile reported this Wednesday that the positivity rate – the number of infections of covid-19 detected for every 100 PCR tests performed – rose to 11.01%, a figure that had not been recorded since the worst time of the pandemic, in June 2020.

The percentage was obtained from the results of 35,006 PCR tests carried out in the previous day and was accompanied by a count of 3,958 new infections, which is at the average of 4,000 daily cases that has been registered since the end of February, with peaks of over 5,000.

A positivity rate of less than 5% for two consecutive weeks is one of the epidemiological criteria established by the World Health Organization (WHO) to consider the pandemic controlled.

These new records of Chile They are a consequence of the southern summer vacations, which are at their peak in February, explained a few days ago from the Ministry of Health, and have motivated large cities in the country to go into quarantine again.

• Chile surpasses Israel and becomes the country with the fastest coronavirus vaccine in the world
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• Chile quarantines the cities of Valparaíso, La Serena and Coquimbo due to the rise in coronavirus infections

All this despite the successful vaccination process carried out Chile, a leader in Latin America and one of the best in the world, being, together with Israel, the country that is inoculating the doses the fastest per 100 people, already reaching a dose to more than 4 million people of the 19 million that the country has .

With the data reported this day by the Ministry of Health, there are already 867,949 people who have been infected with covid-19 in Chile since the start of the pandemic, of which 27,982 are in the active stage of the virus.

Regarding deaths, the authorities counted another 24 due to causes associated with covid-19, leaving the total at 21,206.

BEDS IN INTENSIVE CARE UNITS

The daily report also reported that 1,881 people are hospitalized in Intensive Care Units (ICU) -42 more than the previous day-, of which 1,609 are on mechanical ventilation support.

At this time, there is a total of 204 ICU beds available for the patient who requires it throughout the country.

Given these data, the president of the Medical College, Izkia Siches, said that they are “very concerned” about the current situation of the pandemic and that, if they only took the indicator of occupied ICU beds, “all of Chile should be in confinement.”

“They are within their capacity, even with expansion, already well exceeded, bordering on 100%. We have always stated that more than continuing to expand critical beds, it is necessary to lower the number of cases “, Siches told the local newspaper El Sur.

QUARANTINES

Given the rebound in cases that had been experienced, since last Thursday it increased by Chile the number of communes (sectors of cities or entire localities) for which the Ministry of Health decreed quarantine.

Pending the new announcements from the authorities, at this moment there are quarantines decreed for 244 communes of the 346 that the country has, among those that are in total confinement and those that have this restriction only on weekends.

If this amount is maintained, next weekend 90% of the country’s population would be confined, according to information from the local digital Emol.