Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic (CNN) – Just a couple of weeks ago, Francis de la Nuez and his wife were ecstatic about the birth of their baby girl. But Covid-19 put a tragic end to her hopes, truncating a 34-week pregnancy.
At the gates of the Dr. Marcelino Vélez Santana Regional Hospital in Santo Domingo, the capital of the Dominican Republic, de la Nuez told CNN that he is still in a state of shock.
“My wife contracted covid-19 10 days ago. She had a high fever. She also had very strong muscle aches that caused contractions. Our girl died. When we went for an ultrasound, it was too late,” he explains.
His wife continues to recover in the hospital’s intensive care unit. The de la Nuez family is one of many dealing with another wave of infections in this Caribbean nation of nearly 11 million people. Last week, in the same hospital, 17 of the 18 ICU beds were occupied and only one ventilator remained.
Until recently, the Dominican Republic appeared to be heading toward normalcy. In September, a record number of tourists visited the Caribbean nation, and more than 2 million students from the public education system returned to face-to-face classes for the first time in more than a year. On October 11, the state of emergency was lifted throughout the country.
But was it too early?
Just as students returned to classrooms, COVID-19 cases began to increase, according to data published by Johns Hopkins University (JHU).
Less than two weeks later, Carissa Etienne, director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), announced that, although the trend of covid-19 in most of Latin America and the Caribbean was downward, new cases they had increased more than 40% in the Dominican Republic.
Covid-19 in the Dominican Republic: new variants, reopening of schools and vaccination rates
Dr. Jorge Marte, director of the Center for Diagnosis, Advanced Medicine and Telemedicine (Cedimat), one of the main hospitals in Santo Domingo, points out the spread of new variants and the reopening of schools as significant factors in the increase in cases in the country.
The country’s Ministry of Public Health was quick to control the new spread, announcing on October 8 new precautionary measures requiring those over 13 to show a vaccination card or negative PCR test to access public places, such as schools and workplaces. A proof of vaccination will also be required to enter restaurants, gyms and public transport.
But these measures could only go so far, according to Marte, who claims that despite the introduction of booster vaccines, the country’s overall vaccination campaign has been insufficient.
Less than 50% of the total Dominican population has been fully vaccinated, according to the JHU. The government had set out to vaccinate 70% of the country’s eligible population with at least two doses.
“We have not yet vaccinated the population we set out to do,” says Marte, who is also a presidential adviser on health.
The Minister of Health of the Dominican Republic, Daniel Rivera, has described the resurgence of the virus as a crisis of the unvaccinated, who are depleting health resources and occupying ICU beds.
“Of the last 31 people who died, 29 of them were not vaccinated. And the only person who was vaccinated and died was a 68-year-old patient,” Rivera said during a press conference last week.
Dr. Indira Jiménez, in charge of the covid-19 unit at Hospital Francisco Moscoso Cuello, told CNN that 90% of infected patients who arrive at her hospital were not vaccinated or had only received a vaccine.
“There has been a very notable increase in the number of infected patients. Those who are admitted to the intensive care unit are already in critical condition,” said Jiménez. On Friday, there were no ventilators available at his hospital.
However, death rates remain much lower than in the early days of the pandemic. Eighteen people died of COVID-19 last week, compared to 165 deaths in the first week of February, the peak of COVID-19 deaths in the Dominican Republic so far.
Recently, Mars says it has also observed a new factor in covid-19 hospitalizations.
He affirms that Sinovac, one of the vaccines in which the Dominican Republic relied a lot, has not given the results that the health authorities expected, although conclusive studies are still pending. The country has introduced booster vaccines to increase protection, but they have not yet gone mainstream, with only 1.2 million recipients so far.
In fact, the Dominican Republic was the first country in Latin America to approve booster vaccines, starting with its healthcare workers in July. However, it was not the only country in the region that began to complement its Sinovac campaign.
Following another devastating wave of infections, Chilean President Sebastián Piñera announced in early August that those who had received two doses of the Sinovac vaccine could receive a booster shot from AstraZeneca or Pfizer, starting with the elderly. And the Uruguayan Ministry of Health made a similar decision, opting to give Pfizer booster vaccines to residents who had received two doses of the Chinese-made vaccine.
“What I can say with very objective data is that there is a huge difference between those who have received two doses of Sinovac versus those who have added a Pfizer booster vaccine to those two Sinovac vaccines,” Marte said.
“In the entire country, not a single individual has received a booster shot from Pfizer and ended up hospitalized.”
Marte also said that of the 17,000 covid-19 patients seen at his hospital, only five contracted the virus after receiving the booster vaccine from Pfizer. One of them was an 86-year-old patient and another 78 who suffered from diabetes and cancer. None of the five had to be admitted, he said.
Jessica Hasbun in Santo Domingo, Rafael Romo in Mexico City, and Valentina DiDonato in Atlanta contributed to this report.
–
