Pepe Mujica: “We fall asleep, we trust each other and we will be the last to vaccinate”

“We will surely be the last country in South America to start vaccinating against the coronavirus”, admitted to Uruguay on former president José MujicaAt the same time, with his usual frontality, he considered that the Uruguayans “were falling asleep, we were delaying and the truth was that we had possibilities (to buy the vaccines), but we were closing because of a question of prejudices or illusions … “.

With Chile leads the region with an impressive vaccination operation throughout its territory, Argentina is progressing slowly due to the delay in receiving shipments of Sputnik V vaccine from Moscow and other countries on the continent have also undertaken inoculation of their risk groups, Uruguay closes the line without having yet been able to initiate the process, not even its health workers.

For Mujica, the Uruguayan challenge “is not easy”, because a country of only 3 million inhabitants is facing “an unequal world” when searching for vaccines. “Lhe countries with many resources have gone to buy left and right, even offering to pay more ”, he underlined, indicating that “if some even bought much more vaccines than their number of population”.

President Luis Lacalle Pou is preparing to announce this week an agreement to purchase the first 250,000 doses to the American-German Pfizer / BioNTech consortium, as expected by the Uruguayan press.

“Apparently some labs, among those in the running, are trying to take advantage of the situation; I was told from abroad, for example, that one of the well-known companies, which manufactures vaccines, has asked in some countries for legal commitments, that no claims be made for secondary setbacks that might arise. Said Mujica, who said Uruguayans until the vaccines arrive are left as “tools only the chin strap, distance and isolation”.

This is not the first time that Mujica has spoken critically about laboratories and vaccines, since last month he had mentioned the “economic demands” that have been imposed on certain countries for the purchase of the first production batches. In this regard, Mujica had evoked a “trade war between the laboratories”, speaking in this showdown of “inconceivable shades of political action”.

Pepe Mujica criticized the “economic demands” of vaccination laboratories

“Whoever can will have to work, but work directly at his house, no parties or social gatherings”Mujica added, lamenting that “we have to call it the new normal,” he said of life in Uruguay these days.

Uruguay is one of the countries least affected by the pandemic, but over the past few weeks he has still seen a substantial increase in infections.

Since the start of the pandemic, there have been 21,426 confirmed cases (608 in the last 24 hours), of which 5,676 people had an ongoing infection (72 hospitalized, all in intensive care) and 211 died (none on the last day), reported the National Emergency System (Sinae).

HB