The Santiago metropolitan region returns to …

Schools and non-essential businesses will remain closed until further notice in the 52 municipalities that make up Chile’s Santiago metropolitan region, which entered strict quarantine on Saturday. Citizens of the capital will only be able to leave their homes with a travel permit. On the same Saturday, the Chilean Ministry of Health reported 107 deaths and 96% occupancy of intensive care beds nationwide.

This is the third total quarantine in Santiago since the start of the health crisis due to the covid-19 pandemic. Last April, the metropolitan region was in total quarantine for one month and eight weeks in 2020. It is in this region that 40 percent of the population of the Andean country is concentrated, or more than seven million people. The streets have woken up with less traffic, although the flow of people has been greater compared to previous lockdowns.

With the strict stay-at-home order, people will only be able to go out for essential purchases or specific legwork. In pharmacies and supermarkets they must present a travel permit, it will be granted only twice a week (and only one shift on weekends). Without this authorization, they cannot be served in essential shops. The country maintains the curfew between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m. and the borders closed until June 30.

“We want to call on the responsibility of each person to respect the sanitary measures. If you are asked to respect the measures, do it”, asked the Minister of Health, Enrique Paris. According to data from the health authority, more than 3,200 people are hospitalized in intensive care units (ICU) and more than 2,800 of them need mechanical ventilation.

Chilean authorities have ruled out circulation of the Delta variant, which is currently prevalent in the UK, and focused on vaccinating groups reluctant to be vaccinated despite his call. Most of them are over 39 years old. “To those people who feel invulnerable, I tell them it’s not like that. They can fall badly and die,” Paris said.

Chile has already vaccinated 59% of its target population: 11.3 million people have already received at least one dose and 8.8 million with two doses of the total. The target population includes 15.2 million people out of the total 19 million inhabitants of the Andean country. Despite advances in vaccination the intensive care unit occupancy rate is 96 percent with only 180 intensive care beds available nationwide and only 40 in Santiago.

Nicolas muena, virologist of Science and Life Foundation stressed the importance of ensuring that more people can be vaccinated. “We have to wait until there are 75 or 80 percent vaccinated with two doses to get herd immunity, and even then we won’t know if that will be achieved,” he explained.

Within the country, the region with the highest occupancy rate of intensive care beds is The lakes, with 99% occupancy, followed by three regions with 98% occupancy of intensive care beds: Valparaiso, Coquimbo and in the metropolitan area where they can only break the quarantine to vote this Sunday in the regional elections.

“Out of 100,000 unvaccinated people between the ages of 41 and 50, 14 fall into an intensive care bed, while only 1 in 100,000 of those vaccinated,” he illustrated. the Under-Secretary for Health Networks, Alberto Dougnac. “This difference is maintained even in other age groups who are at higher risk of serious illness. That is why we insist on getting vaccinated.”

Chile recorded 7,624 cases and 107 deaths from covid-19 this Saturday, for a total of over 1.4 million infections and over 30,400 deaths since the start of the pandemic, according to the Directorate of Health Statistics and Information (DEIS).

This Sunday, 13 of the 16 Chilean regions will have a second electoral round to define their governors. The metropolitan region is one of them, along with Antofagasta, Atacama, Arica, Biobío, Coquimbo, La Araucanía, Los Lagos, Los Ríos, Libertador Bernardo O’Higgins, Maule, Ñuble and Tarapacá. During tomorrow’s elections, a preferential time is planned (from 2 p.m.) for groups at risk, even if with the worsening of the health crisis, it is expected that fewer people will go to the polls.