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Ecuadorian President Lenín Moreno admitted on Wednesday (15) that he was not prepared to face the coronavirus epidemic, which has already killed hundreds of people and caused chaos in Guayaquil, the country’s financial center.
“I read and heard several comments that indicate that we were not prepared. Of course we were not prepared. No one was. No government, in any country, was prepared,” Moreno said on national radio and television.
The head of state noted that the epidemic took the country out of empty coffers due to the economic difficulties it is experiencing.
Ecuador, with 7,858 cases and 388 confirmed deaths (more than 1,000 suspected deaths) is one of the countries most affected in Latin America by the new coronavirus. It especially reaches the province of Guayas (southwest), whose capital is Guayaquil.
The city of Guayaquil has registered innumerable cases of bodies without extraction in homes and even on the streets, with crowded hospitals and the population asking for help. Mayor Cynthia Viteri says hospitals and cemeteries collapsed, even before the crisis peaked. “There is no room for the living or the dead,” he said.
/i.s3.glbimg.com/v1/AUTH_59edd422c0c84a879bd37670ae4f538a/internal_photos/bs/2020/1/m/xkJfM3QK2kmQb2K1PwtQ/protecao.jpg "Men with only masks carry a coffin to a cemetery in Guayaquil, Ecuador, on Sunday (12) - Photo: Vicente Gaibor del Pino / Reuters")
Men with only masks carry a coffin to a cemetery in Guayaquil, Ecuador, on Sunday (12) – Photo: Vicente Gaibor del Pino / Reuters
Moreno created a joint police and military force to deal with the collapse of the funeral system in Guayaquil, where there are “1,424 deaths in hospitals and homes.”
Funeral homes stopped working due to mobility restrictions due to curfew and fear of contamination by their employees.
The situation prompted Vice President Otto Sonnenholzner to apologize for the “serious deterioration” in the country’s international image.
