(Efe/Reuters/Agencies) – The American continent is at the height of the pandemic. The United States remains the red hot spot of the disease globally, with over 1.5 million infections and 90,000 deaths. The crisis has dragged almost 39 million people into unemployment in that country. The Democratic majority in the House of Representatives has approved a $3 trillion bailout. Still, the Senate – controlled by the Republican party – has threatened to overturn it.
The United States has reserved one-third of the first doses of an experimental covid-19 vaccine made by Oxford University and the British pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca. The American giant has committed 1.2 billion dollars, ensuring 300 million treatments for the country.
Since World War II, access to the first vaccines will be tight amidst high pressure on world leaders to overcome the worst economic and social destruction. In addition to this British firm, the US government has already reached agreements with Johnson & Johnson, Moderna, and Sanofi for the development of the first vaccines. These announcements are raising fears that only wealthy nations can protect their citizens from the epidemic.
In Latin America and the Caribbean, more than 500,000 infections have already detected. The Latin American epicenter is in Brazil, where the health minister has resigned after just one month in office. Meanwhile, Chile has registered more than 4,000 infections in the last 24 hours. In Mexico, the rising phase of the pandemic continues. This Wednesday, the country already counts more than 6,000 deaths. More than 20% of the 56,594 people infected by covid-19 in Mexico are health workers.
Brazil points to 20,000 deaths from the virus. It is the third most contagious country in the world after the United States and Russia.
Peru has almost 100,000 infected and more than 3,000 dead. In the last 24 hours, 4,537 cases confirmed.
Mexico has over 6,000 deaths.
Worldwide, the pandemic has so far surpassed five million infections, and more than 328,000 people have died, according to the Johns Hopkins University count.
Guayaquil, Ecuador, one of the cities hardest hit by the covid-19 in Latin America, is regaining some normality after months of a collapse of the health system and funeral homes, unable to supply coffins to bury so many of the dead that they ended up dying in their homes or even in the streets, leaving one of the worst images of the pandemic on the continent.
Guayaquil has changed the color of its “sanitary traffic light” from red to yellow, which means the opening of hairdressing salons, workshops, hardware stores, and laundries. According to official data in Guayaquil, there are 9,140 confirmed cases of coronavirus and 890 deaths as of this Thursday.
In Peru, an emergency decree was published approving buffer mechanisms to mitigate the economic effects on the Culture sector produced in the Health Emergency by #COVID19 and allocating 11 million dollars to artists, entrepreneurs, and cultural organizations affected by the pandemic. Besides, some 36 million USD is already being distributed among thousands of families in the country’s poorest sectors. This donation, promoted by the Banco de Crédito del Perú (BCP), has collected contributions from 73,000 companies and natural donors.
Throughout Peru, families who are on extreme poverty levels who were not receiving money from other public aid funds promoted by the Government were given the addition of 760 soles (about $218).
Peru is one of the countries hardest hit in Latin America by covid-19. On Wednesday, the country surpassed 100,000 infections and 3,000 deaths.