COVID: alarm in Brazil due to the number of young people who have died in intensive care units

The new wave of COVID-19 has reached Brazil at the end of january and in two months it had an unexpected impact. At the same time as the new Brazilian variant, the P1 or the Amazon, spread throughout the country, a phenomenon materialized: the elderly, with greater possibilities of staying at home and already vaccinated, ceased to occupy intensive therapy beds. But that didn’t make the system any easier. They have unfortunately been replaced by young people and adults aged 18 to 50.

Throughout 2020, hospitals were populated with people aged 60 to 80. But in the first quarter of 2021, everything changed. The increase in confirmed cases in the general population was 316%. But Among women and men aged 30 to 59, the growth is surprising: over 500%. The data comes from a very prestigious scientific institution: the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (or Fiocruz), which manufactures the Oxford-Astra Zeneca vaccine.

The data calls into question the greater resistance of the youngest. Between January and March, Fiocruz emphasizes, the number of deaths between 40 and 49 years old climbed by 419%. And as for those aged 30 to 39, it has climbed 353%. The researchers attribute the new circumstances to two relevant factors: the lack of social isolation and the spread of the P1 strain. Data collected from civil registers show that in March alone, 21,000 Brazilians between the ages of 30 and 59 died. These data represent three times the records made between July and August of last year.

Civil registration data shows that in March alone 21,000 Brazilians aged 30 to 59 died

Of course, there are reasons why tragedy has taken hold in this band of population: it is they who make up the universe of the economically active. In December 2020, the government of Jair Bolsonaro judged that everything had passed and that there would be no more epidemic. As a result, they ended emergency financial assistance to those who lost their jobs. No one imagined then that a catastrophic regrowth. When they stopped receiving the allowance, which at the time was little more than $ 115, the Brazilians resumed their tasks as in the past, with crowded, rush-hour trips by bus and metro.

In January, the crisis erupted in Manaus, the state capital of Amazonas. What came out first was the lack of oxygen tubes; But we would soon discover that this Brazilian variant of the Covid-19 se had become a more contagious and aggressive vector. Victor Chiavegato, medical director of the field hospitals of Santo André, municipality of Greater São Paulo, described the epidemic as a direct product of the relaxation of restrictive regulations put in place in 2020. “If we had stayed at home, this strain would not have spread or had the current strength” Tenuous. The contagions, he added, came “from young people and boys working in the streets, from people in churches”.

Young people arrive at hospital in serious condition

Suzana Lobo, the doctor who chairs the Brazilian Association of Intensive Medicine, made another observation. According to his hospital experience, “a sharp increase young patients in intensive care who arrive in a very serious condition on hospitalization ”. For the specialist, “we really observe an average of 35 to 40 years among the patients who arrive now. And we’ve seen it since the first half of January. ” Furthermore, she maintains that the situation it can be made worse “by the collapse of hospitals and sanatoriums”.

Young adults “might have a better chance of survival in principle. But the truth is, they continue in ICU longer than the elderly.

Young people arrive without co-morbidities, “but often they require mechanical ventilation and even intubation,” explains the therapist. Another, no less significant, phenomenon is that young adults “may initially have a better chance of survival. But the truth is, they continue in ICU longer than the elderly. And that’s what causes the collapse ”.

The Brazilian Intensive Care Physicians Association has released frightening data. He declares that “the number of young people killed tripled between November and March”. So much so that the deaths of people under 45, accommodated in ICUs, represented 40% last month: that is to say that 4 in 10 young Brazilians admitted to hospitals lost their lives.

The impact that the Manaus variant may have in this process is under discussion. In Brazil, specialists believe that this strain of virus is more deadly. But an article published in The Lancet on the health of children and adolescents, he concluded something different. According to this study, the increase in Covid in this population group is due to “the lack of control of the pandemic”.

* Author from Brazil 7 days. From São Paulo, Brazil.