The resurgence of Covid-19 in Brazil pushes hospitals to overflow

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On the outskirts of São Paulo, the crisis is turning things upside down for the small emergency hospital Dr Akira Tada. Normally, doctors stabilized critically ill patients and then sent them to larger, better-equipped hospitals with intensive care units (ICUs).

But these are not normal times. Today, few hospitals have space to take in new patients, even in Brazil’s richest and most populous state.

When Dineia Martins Firmino entered the hospital in early March, doctors intubated the 76-year-old woman and told her family that she was in desperate need of being transferred to an intensive care unit for more sophisticated treatment. according to his granddaughter Pamela Rivippi, 30.

She has never been excluded from the official government-run transfer list. “No vacancies appeared when she needed it and she ended up dying on Saturday,” Ravippi said. “We had the funeral on Sunday.”

The fierce new wave of the coronavirus that claimed Firmino’s life is flooding intensive care beds in São Paulo and across the country.

As of Sunday, 21 Brazilian states and the Federal District had an intensive care unit occupancy rate of over 80%. Of these, 14 were on the verge of collapse with over 90% occupancy.

In the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul, intensive care units are so overcrowded that the largest public hospital treating Covid-19 cases in the state capital, Porto Alegre, said on Sunday it had been forced to close its doors to new patients.

“The hospital’s Covid intensive care unit is already serving 132% occupancy,” the hospital management of the Porto Alegre das Clinicas hospital said in a statement.

With crowded rooms comes an increasing demand for oxygen and other commodities. To the north, Rondonia state is at 97.6% intensive care unit occupancy and the attorney general’s office has warned that local oxygen supplies could run out in just two weeks.

The state faces an “imminent risk of oxygen shortage,” the letter read – a reminder of an earlier crisis in the city of Manaus, the state capital of Amazonas, where hospitals ran out of oxygen in January with fatal consequences.
Faced with criticism of its handling of the pandemic, including from former President Lula da Silva, the Brazilian federal government has singled out a new, possibly more contagious, local coronavirus variant that is currently spreading to across the country and even abroad.
But experts also attribute the spread to Brazilians’ failure to adhere to mask and social distancing guidelines, encouraged by President Jair Bolsonaro, who sees the precautionary measures as dangerous for the economy and social stability. In São Paulo, officials have used the mole-stealing tactic of attacking nightlife hot spots to disperse gatherings of hundreds, Reuters reported.
Meanwhile, despite a solid historical immunization record, the national rollout of Covid-19 vaccines in Brazil has been slow. Only 1.4% of the population has been fully vaccinated.

Brazilian Health Minister Pazuello, himself currently under investigation for his handling of the Manaus crisis, recently estimated that 22 to 25 million doses would be available in March – a sharp drop from previous forecasts that until to 46 million doses of vaccine would be available this month. .

The federal government is negotiating new vaccine deals, including a purchase order for the Russian-made Sputnik V., but shortages persist for the time being. In the coastal city of Rio de Janeiro, officials have already been forced to suspend the administration of the first doses. The campaign will restart once vaccines are available through Brazil’s health ministry, Rio Mayor Eduardo Paes said.

Brazil plunges into crisis as second wave and deadly new variant overwhelm hospitals

With the death toll per day in the thousands, every passing hour means lives lost.

In a grim five-day streak this month, a dozen Covid-19 patients died at Dr Akira Tada hospital, hospital officials said. All were on a waiting list to be transferred to an intensive care unit.

Dr Maria Dolores da Silva, emergency doctor at the hospital, has never seen anything like it. A 42-year-old veteran of the Brazilian public health system, she is generally not shy about talking about her work, but in an interview with CNN, she bowed her head and cried, thinking of the loss.

“Psychologically it affects us,” said Dr da Silva. “As much as we want to be strong, feelings come to the surface because of so much suffering that we are seeing.”

A local court recently intervened, ordering that at least 17 intensive care beds be made available to those awaiting transfer, pointing to public statistics for the state of São Paulo, which claim that around 10% intensive care beds in the area are still available. The state faces a fine of $ 6,000 for every day it does not provide beds for these patients.

But dozens of other patients of Dr Akira Tada continue to wait to be transferred for treatment. Sunday morning, a 13th patient on hold died.

As of Sunday evening, none of the remaining patients had been transferred.

CNN reporters Rodrigo Pedroso, Marcia Reverdosa and Matt Rivers reported from São Paulo. CNN’s Caitlin Hu reported from New York.

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