Days before the Copa América, Brazil recorded the second highest number of COVID-19 cases since the start of the pandemic

Brazil, one of the countries most affected by the coronavirus in the world, recorded 2,507 new deaths from COVID-19 on Wednesday, bringing the total number of deaths from the disease in the country to 467,706, reported the Ministry of Health.

According to the agency, they were also 95,601 new cases of coronavirus identified, the total number of infections in the country rising to 16,720,081. The Wednesday’s figure is second highest for a single day since the start of the pandemic, just below 100,158 cases registered on March 25.

Brazil registers the second highest number of deaths from COVID-19 worldwide, behind only United States, and the third highest number of confirmed cases, after United States e India.

The Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz) warned in a note released Wednesday about the risk of new variants of the coronavirus spreading in the country, in particular the so-called Delta, which was initially detected in India.

“We are in the midst of a big and serious problem: the variants tend to spread all over the country. It is very likely that, in a few months, the Delta variant will be present throughout the national territory and other variants will emerge.», Declared the coordinator of the Fiocruz sanitary watch and reference laboratories, Rivaldo Venâncio, during a hearing in the Chamber of Deputies the day before.

New data comes after the South American country has been chosen to host the Copa América, after Argentina and Colombia have given up on hosting the tournament, as originally planned. The tournament, which will be played without an audience, in strict compliance with protocols which include a strict health bubble, will start on June 11 and it will last a month.

Meanwhile, according to data from the Ministry of Health, São Paulo, the Brazilian state most affected by COVID-19 based on absolute numbers, reached the mark of 3,314,631 cases and 112,927 deaths.

In addition, Minas Gerais is the second state with the most infections of coronaviruses recorded, with 1,594,420 cases, but Rio de Janeiro ranks second in number of deaths, with 51,096.

The federal government also reports 15,168,330 people recovered COVID-19 and 1,084,045 patients in follow-up.

Brazil considers the advancement of mass vaccination of its population as the best weapon to control the pandemic, although so far just over 20% of Brazilians have received the first dose of one of the formulas used in the country.

However, the authorities rely on a acceleration of local vaccine production to speed up the vaccination process In the next weeks.

In this sense, the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz) today announced the arrival of stem cell and virus banks that will allow produce the AstraZeneca vaccine independently in Brazil, a day after signing a technology transfer agreement to locally manufacture the drug from the Anglo-Swedish laboratory.

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