Contagions are increasing in Chile and they warn: “We must prepare for the worst”

Chile Medical College (Colmed) president Izkia Siches warned society needs to prepare “for the most difficult stage”, as the country continues to face an increase in coronavirus cases in recent weeks.

“We must prepare for the worst”Siches anticipated, quoted by the newspapers El Mercurio and Cooperativa, but preferred to be careful and move away from the projections: “You have to measure every day and look at the numbers for each day, rather than making predictions which can ultimately lead to Something. totally different”.

In the last days, Chile has seen an increase in Covid-19 cases after two months of decline. As of Saturday, it reported nearly 750 people infected, and just over 850 on Friday for the second day in a row; such figures had been recorded in early August. As, the average number of infections over the past seven days is 570.

As for deaths from the disease, as of Saturday there were nine, after the daily figure was 13 on Friday and 31 on Thursday. The average number of deaths in the past seven days is 13.

“As a country, we have to learn from these mistakes. It has happened to us twice already and it has cost the lives of a large number of compatriots”, said the president of Colmed.

Siches added that the country is “at the time of greatest uncertainty “, so as not to know the “size that this wave is going to be”.

According to the doctor, three scenarios can be presented: that of collective immunity and that the wave passes without major impact; that of a panorama similar to that of Israel, England and the United States, with a wave that affects the vaccinated and the unvaccinated; that of a wave worse than the previous ones, as happened in Southeast Asia and Africa.

Faced with the possibility of a new quarantine, Siches expressed that he hopes they will no longer be enforced, but added: “I understand that if we have an increase in cases, if the Delta variant hits us and the critical units have a significant impact increase, this is something we cannot rule out“.

Regarding the acquisition of vaccines, the expert stressed that “making negotiations very early on was very fruitful and also the expansion in terms of the care response of critical beds”, but underlined that the errors of the Government focus on governance and transparency.

Since September 24, Chile had vaccinated 79% of the population against the coronavirus, or nearly 15 million people, at least with one dose, while 74.4%, or just over 14 million, had the full guideline.

Since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic and until this Sunday, the country had accumulated more than 1.65 million people infected and 37,423 deaths from the disease.