Covid-19 in Latin America: Six countries in the top 10 with the highest mortality rate

The second wave of coronavirus is strongly felt in Europe. The images of hospitals on the brink of collapse in several countries and new daily records of infections and deaths remind us of the bleak panorama of March and April, when the pandemic devastated that continent. As the cold winter approaches, Europeans are preparing for the worst. As the director for Europe of the World Health Organization (WHO), Hans Kluge, warned in September: “It will be harder. In October, in November, we will see a higher mortality ”.

With most of the countries emerging from months of confinement, the situation in Latin America it seems to be much more auspicious than the one experienced today in Europe. However, in a reminder that the pandemic is still active in the region, the deputy director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), Jarbas Barbosasaid Wednesday that coronavirus cases continue to grow at a rate “vertiginous” in America, after last week reported an average of 150,000 daily infections in the region.

Since the start of the pandemic, the coronavirus has infected nearly 22 million people in the Region of the Americas and has caused the death of more than 660,000 people, just over 50% of deaths worldwide, PAHO Director Carissa F. Etienne reinforced in her weekly press conference on the Covid-19.

A panorama that is reflected in the indices collected by the Worldometers site (among countries with more than one million inhabitants), which shows that Six of the 10 countries with the highest death rate from the coronavirus are in Latin America. In the world ranking that leads Belgium, with 1,185 deaths per million inhabitants, immediately appears in second place Peru, with an index of 1,058.

At the end of August, Peru momentarily ranked first among the countries with the highest mortality from the coronavirus, after Belgium corrected its death toll and subtracted 121 deaths from its balance from the impact of the disease. On that occasion, the BBC provided some factors that explained the situation of the South American country, the same one that at the beginning of the pandemic garnered praise for being one of the first to impose restrictions and allocate greater aid packages for people affected by the suspension of the economy. Thus, along with the deficiency in the health system and an approach focused more on intensive care than on prevention, the British chain also listed the shortage of oxygen, the agglomerations formed for the distribution of economic bonds and the non-compliance of the restrictions designed to prevent contagion. With more than 930 thousand cases, Peru already has 35,067 deaths from Covid-19.

After Peru, Brazil, with 771 deaths per million inhabitants, appears as the country with the highest mortality rate from coronavirus in the region. Brazil ranks third in the world in number of infections, with 5,783,647 cases, and second in total deaths, with 164,332, only surpassed by the United States, which registers 248,585 deaths.

Below are Argentina and Chile, with a mortality rate of 767 deaths per million inhabitants. The trans-Andean country, which reached that figure yesterday, was involved in a controversy in October, after the global data measurement organization Our World in Data, which depends on the University of Oxford, decided to stop including the figures in its report due to a possible bias in the “positivity rate” and “unclear” information. Today Argentina is in eighth place in the number of infections (1,284,519 cases) and 11th in terms of death figures (34,782). Chile, for his part, it ranks 17th worldwide in number of cases (with 526,438) and 16th in total number of deaths (14,699).

Bolivia It appears after Argentina in the mortality rate from Covid-19 at the regional level. Its index is 752 deaths per million inhabitants. According to the most recent epidemiological report released yesterday in Bolivia, the country shows a sustained growth of new infections in the last three days. The Ministry of Health confirmed 112 new positives, which raised the national total to 142,889, but on November 8 it declared 48 positive cases, a day later the figure rose to 86 and on November 10 the number of infected in the country arrived to 103, signaling a steady climb. Bolivia adds 8,818 deaths from Covid-19.

In the 10th place worldwide in the death rate from coronavirus, Mexico records an index of 750 deaths per million inhabitants. The country adds 991,835 infections and 97,056 deaths from the coronavirus.

Despite these figures, the deputy director of PAHO, Jarbas Barbosa, he assured that the situation differs in each of the countries of the continent and there are some that are experiencing a “constant” decrease in Covid-19 cases.

Although these figures indicate a vertiginous increase of the virus, the situation differs depending on where we are in the region.

Jarbas Barbosa, PAHO Deputy Director

“As we look further south, some countries and regions do better than others,” added.

Barbosa, a Brazilian doctor, explained that Covid-19 cases continue to rise in North America, especially in the populous Mexican capital, Mexico City, and in the United States, the nation most affected by the pandemic in the world.

Rather, he held that in the Caribbean and Central America several countries have experienced a “constant decline” in cases of the virus due to ongoing control measures. In addition, he praised the actions of Argentina, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay to keep the transmission “under control.”

But Barbosa warned: “Regardless of the changing dynamics in different parts of the region, the virus continues to be a threat and is still claiming many lives.” “The situation in Europe should serve as a warning for the Americas region, since it shows that even after controlling infections by the Covid-19 virus, countries are still vulnerable to a resurgence of the virus,” reiterated the director of PAHO, Carissa F. Etienne.

In the opinion of the health worker Mauricio Canals, Chile “It has a large number of deaths due to a particular situation: the great epidemic in the Metropolitan Region”. Along these lines, he adds that “when one compares with other countries, Chile has a high death toll, because it has a high number of cases, not because it has bad medicine.”

Regarding the high presence of American countries in the first 10 positions of the ranking, Canals summarizes what, from his point of view, are the elements that affect the most. “The first thing is the factor of population aging. The second factor, and I think the most important, is the large number of cases in a short period of time. When that happens, there is an increase in mortality. In America, at the same time, there are particular conditions of poverty that mean that people’s access to health is not the same ”, he concludes.

Meanwhile, the former Undersecretary of Health and WHO consultant, Jeanette vega, coincides with the aging variable and adds two other elements: registration systems and testing.

“To be able to register and say that there are people who are dying from Covid-19, you must have a system that records the cause of death and, therefore, there is a small part that could be explained by having better records of cause of death. Also, the more PCR is done, the more possibility there is of capturing cases and the more possibility of attributing a death to Covid-19 “ says the former undersecretary.

In short, for Vega the issue is based on three factors. “These are countries that have indeed been hit hard by the pandemic. Factor two, probably the countries that lead the ranking have a demographic composition with a little more older people and, the third, is that there is probably an issue of registration that is influencing ”, explains the expert.