In her weekly media briefing on March 31, Dr. Carissa F. Etienne, executive director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), urged all member countries to remain on “high alert,” because the coronavirus pandemic is by no means under control in the Americas. PAHO is the World Health Organization’s adjunct for the Americas. The region is seeing increased numbers of COVID cases and deaths—19.7 million cases since Jan. 1, and 475,000 deaths. In the past four weeks, she reported, an average 1 million new cases were recorded every 7 days, with Brazil, Chile, Peru, and Paraguay in the spotlight as nations with very high death rates, to which collapsing hospital and healthcare systems are a contributing factor, because people can’t get the care they need to survive.
The situation is made worse, Dr. Etienne explained, by the shortage of vaccines, although the situation is improving slowly, with the UN’s COVAX mechanism kicking in with 2.5 million doses arriving in 17 countries in the last 30 days. But, she pointedly continued, vaccine supply “continues to be our greatest challenge,” largely due to delays in production. And, she warned, “we are also seeing far too many examples of vaccine nationalism, which limits global availability even further. The current system is hard-wired for inequity, and that is not acceptable. Vaccines should be available to all who need them, regardless of where they live.”
In countries where cases are rising, governments are imposing new restrictive measures to try to stem the spread. Paraguay’s rate of deaths per million, (6.27 over 7 days) is second only to Brazil’s rate of 11.17. Thus far, the Abdo Benitez government has ignored pleas from elected and medical officials to close the border with Brazil, seen as a major source of spreading infection.
Despite having the most successful vaccination program in Ibero-America (30% of the population have been vaccinated), Chile was forced to reimpose tough Phase One restrictions for Holy Week (March 28-April 4) because of rapidly increasing cases, attributed to restrictions having been lifted too soon. Argentina has also reimposed restrictions until April 9, given rising rates in the Buenos Aires metropolitan area. The vaccine shortage is acute in countries such as Ecuador and Peru, where infection rates are soaring. In Ecuador, with 17.4 million inhabitants, only 174,062 have been vaccinated with a first dose, and 60,358 with both. In Peru, with a population of 32.5 million, only 540,000 people have been vaccinated. Moreover, in the Lima-Callao region, with the largest number of cases, there are no ICU beds. Dr. Lesly Solari of Peru’s National Institute of Health, reports that in this second wave, they are seeing more cases of people being reinfected, which may be more lethal in some cases, La Republica reported.
