Brazil, at the limit: they estimate there could be 3,000 deaths per day if action is not taken

BRASILIA.- The daily death toll from Covid-19 in Brazil could reach 3000 if serious measures are not taken to stop the spread of the virus, according to a presentation made at a meeting of the government crisis response team, sources present at the meeting told Reuters.

The diagnosis is the result of a perfect storm: the spread of the virus throughout the country, driven by crowds at the end of the year and during the carnival; the population’s difficulty in maintaining social isolation; the circulation in the country of new, more contagious variants with a high viral load; the imminent collapse of the hospital system in several states at once; and the lack of vaccines available to immunize Brazilians.

Brazil also recorded 75,495 new cases of the coronavirus as of Friday, bringing the total number of infections in the country to 10,869,227. The mark is also the second highest for a single day since the start of the pandemic, remaining only below that recorded on January 7, of 87,843 infections.

In Rio Grande do Sul, for example, the occupancy rate of intensive care beds has been close to or above 100% throughout the week. In the northern region, although the number of cases is lower, there are concerns about the limited availability of beds. Alerts have also exploded over the situation in states such as Goiás, Minas Gerais, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo.

The inter-ministerial working group, which includes the health ministry and the president’s chief of staff’s office, met on Thursday to discuss the current pandemic situation in Brazil, where a brutal epidemic is deadlier than previous waves.

The moving average for the past two weeks is currently 1,250 deaths per day. Despite the high death toll, sources say the health ministry He sees no possibility of taking national social distancing measures due to resistance from President Jair Bolsonaro.

The president has consistently downplayed the severity of the virus and on Thursday, after two consecutive days of record deaths, told Brazilians to stop “whining”.

The Health Ministry did not give an official response on whether the projections had been presented at the meeting or whether the agency agreed with the numbers. The sources said the estimates were calculated by Brazilian state health secretaries.

Brazil has the second highest death toll in the world, just behind the United States. As the epidemic eases in the United States and Europe, Brazil faces the worst phase of the epidemic, which has brought its hospital system to the brink of collapse.

The rise in infections has led to restrictions in the capital, Brasilia, and the country’s largest city, São Paulo. Health officials are particularly concerned about the emergence of a new variant of the coronavirus in the Amazon region, which appears to be more contagious and more capable of re-infecting those who previously had Covid-19. The government’s delay in acquiring and distributing vaccines also resulted in less than 3.5% of the population having received their first dose.

WHO warning

World Health Organization (WHO) Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Friday warned Brazil that the health situation “is very serious” in the country and urged it to take “aggressive measures” to stop the new epidemic of the coronavirus pandemic. .

“The situation is very serious and we are very worried. The health measures taken by Brazil must be aggressive, while making progress in vaccination, ”the WHO chief said at a press conference.

“The concern doesn’t just revolve around Brazil, but also around Brazil’s neighbors, it’s almost Latin America as a whole, many countries, except two more or less, ”warned Ghebreyesus.

“If Brazil doesn’t take it seriously, it will affect all the neighbors and beyond, so it’s not just about Brazil, I think it concerns all of Latin America,” he said. . The Brazilian government “must take this very, very seriously,” he stressed.

AFP and Reuters agencies

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