Dramatic situation in Cuba: a new record of COVID-19 cases has been recorded

Cuba marked this Tuesday a new daily COVID-19 cases record with 1,537 and broke the absolute maximum of 1,470 infections recorded on Sunday, reported the Ministry of Public Health (Minsap).

The country adds since March of last year 160,594 positive and 1,106 deaths due to complications derived from the disease, 8 of them in the past 24 hours, according to Minsap.

Health authorities have reported that of the 1,537 patients detected today during the analysis of 19,862 samples, 1,489 are indigenous and 48 imported. In Cuban hospitals and isolation centers are admitted 30,834 people: 7,418 active cases -62 in critical condition and 99 serious-, 5,718 with suspicious symptoms and the rest under epidemiological surveillance.

The Cuban dictator, Miguel Diaz Canel, today alerted on Twitter that the number of active cases is also the highest to date. Havana concentrated the largest number of cases nationwide with 375, followed by the eastern province of Santiago de Cuba (215) and the central province of Camaguey (174).

In the Cuban capital, epicenter of the pandemicRestrictive measures have been in place since the start of the year to curb infections, but shortages of food and basic items are forcing people to queue up to buy them. In high-risk territories, including Havana, a health intervention study is being applied with Abdala and Soberana 02, the two most advanced vaccine candidates of the five developed by Cuba.

The clinical trial in children aged 12 to 18 with Soberana 02 also began Monday in Havana.. Nearly two million Cubans, out of a population of 11 million, have received at least one dose of these formulas in clinical trials and intervention studies developed alongside that of health, according to the reports. official data.

The two drugs are in the final phase of clinical trials – which determines the effectiveness of the potential vaccine -, but they do not have pharmacological registration or emergency use authorization from the island’s regulatory authority.

The authorities hope to obtain it in June, once the results of the clinical trials are published., which would allow the start of the mass vaccination campaign. They also believe that they exceed 50% efficiency from the results obtained in the second stage of testing.

Cuba does not integrate the World Health Organization Covax Mechanism created so that low- and middle-income countries have access to vaccines, and did not purchase them on the international market.

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