It took 7 months to arrive and the country is not ready yet

The Delta variant was identified in India in december 2020. In the Asian country, this has wreaked havoc. To date there is 31 million people infected and 423,000 dead. But towards the end of last year, when optimism about the first vaccines reigned, he was a monster the world was watching from afar.

A few months later, the delta began to expand to other latitudes. Today, there is almost no corner of the planet without his presence. Pass more than seven months so that ultimately the Delta decided to plant a flag in Argentina. The weather it took to get there was pretty generous.

With other countries, however, the “old” variant of India did not have the same consideration. When he landed and began to colonize the lands of the last corner of the southern hemisphere, he had already left his relentless imprint on a hundred countries.

The story recalls the the beginnings of the pandemic, while in Argentina the possibility of a Covid entry has been underestimated. It wasn’t exactly the same anymore, but the only measure What the government has really decided is to close the borders so that the virus does not enter through Ezeiza. And if so, identify it and isolate it.

The porosity of land borders He’s never been on the radar. That same Friday, Paraguay confirmed community circulation of the same variant. Presumed Indigenous cases detected in the city we don’t know where they come from. So far, no epidemiological link has been found to explain how the delta reached Monserrat.

Two months ago, at the beginning of June, we learned that the mutations at the origin of the Delta transformed it into a 60% more contagious than those known until then. At that time, he continued to complicate the world health situation away from Argentina. Our country has been “lucky” to face even more “friendly” variants, such as Manaus, the United Kingdom and Rio de Janeiro.

That it was 60 percent more contagious meant you had to be better prepared to face it. But in June, Argentina still did not have the enough vaccines satisfy what experts were already beginning to consider as a condition to prevent the storm from ending up in shipwreck: vaccinate with both doses.

In July, the scenario changed: more vaccines began to arrive in the country. So much so that the Federal Health Council (Cofesa), at the beginning of this month, set itself as a priority accelerate the second doses. The Delta still seemed a distant danger, even as its shadow grew closer and closer.

This priority of Cofesa then was not such. Throughout the month of June the number of second doses applied did not climb and the ratio between the first and the second remained four to one. Last week, Cofesa reiterated priority second doses and the Minister of Health has said this will happen in August.

This Friday, a statement from the Ministry of Health said that the suspected indigenous cases “have been confirmed three months later the first case of Delta variant detected in a traveler, demonstrating the efficiency control measures for travelers within the period of appearance on national territory ”.

In its press release, the government acknowledges having had at least three months to prepare the ground to face this key moment. However, the present barely finds him 6.8 million Argentines vaccinated with the two doses, 24.9 million with one and 5 million over 18 years they did not receive any.

At the same time, there are still thousands of people stranded abroad who must be wondering why did they leave them stranded if, in the meantime, this period was not taken advantage of to advance sufficiently in the application of the second doses. This is a question that unfortunately has no answer.

Starting to prioritize second doses in August means 21 days later of the bite to take effect the antibodies and immunity will start to do their job to become then hopefully a barrier that can prevent the Delta from wreaking havoc in our country.

The almost 7 million people que siguen a la expectativa del componente 2 de la Sputnik V deben esperar that ends el ensayo de combinación de vacunas con AstraZeneca y Sinopharm, que comenzó siete meses después de que supiera que la segunda dosis de la vacuna rusa iba a ser muy difícil de get.

PS