Brazil: record deaths since July and fear of the new strain

RÍO DE JANEIRO.- The Brazilian authorities confirmed that in the last hours there were 1,196 deaths from coronavirus, amid the national and international alert for the new strain registered in the country, in the city of Manaus, capital of the state of Amazonas. With these data, the total deaths reached 223,971 and the average reached 1,071, the highest monthly level since July of last year.

This increase in deaths, which jumped almost 12 percent in two weeks, according to what was published by the newspaper O Globe, It occurred just as the nation began to be isolated due to the measures decreed by various governments, which prohibited air connections to prevent the spread of the virus.

And is that this new variant, that altered the genes that encode the viral spicule, the structure that is found on the surface of the virus and that allows it to invade the cells of the organism, could therefore be much more contagious. It was named P.1.

Germany has already closed its borders with Brazil, like the United Kingdom, Italy hours ago extended the same decision, as well as Argentina, which days ago confirmed the reduction in the frequency of flights by 50% to and from the country.

The information that comes from Manaus is what causes fear. There from the Ministry of Health they recognized that the situation is critical due to the lack of beds and oxygen, so they fear that some patients may die “on the street”, as confessed before congressmen the adviser to the authorities, General Ridauto Fernandes.

An estimated 600 infected are on the waiting list for a bed in Manaus hospitals. Opening intensive care rooms and installing beds is something that “is fine, but the patient is going to die anyway if that bed does not have oxygen,” Fernandes also stated.

Brazil is the second country in the world in number of fatalities, with 223,971 deaths, in addition to adding 9,176,975 positives with coronavirus.

Vaccinations

A string of power outages in Rio de Janeiro could have ruined hundreds of doses of Covid-19 vaccines, dHealth officials came on Friday. Up to 720 doses of the CoronaVac vaccine developed by China Sinovac Biotech could be disposed of after a power outage in the Bonsucesso neighborhood, where a federal hospital is located, left them stored at the wrong temperature.

The hospital director was fired as city officials analyze whether any of the doses can still be used. “We are aware of this and it is something that concerns us. We are drafting a resolution to reinforce the rules and protocols,” said the Secretary of Health of the state of Rio, Carlos Alberto Chaves.

Brazil relies primarily on CoronaVac while it awaits a shipment from China with the active ingredients needed to finish and distribute doses of the vaccine locally. AstraZeneca. Meanwhile, it has already received 2 million injections of AstraZeneca ready for use until the active ingredients arrive, which is not enough to cover 1% of the 210 million inhabitants of Brazil.

In this context, and amid international pressure on pharmaceutical companies due to delays in production, President Jair Bolsonaro, who already had coronavirus and warned that no vaccine will be injected, promised to quickly inoculate all Brazilians, moderating his tone after his support fell due to an uneven distribution of vaccines and the second wave of infections.

In fact, Brazil was listed as the worst country in the world to handle the crisis caused by Covid according to a group of Australian experts from the Lowy Institute.

Reuters and ANSA agencies

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