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With just 71 cases of contagion and without until that minute being recorded dead, the Peruvian President on March 15, Martín Vizcarra, decreed a general quarantine throughout the country and the closure of borders, in order to contain the spread of the virus. When a little over a month has passed since that measure, the figures have soared and yesterday was the second day with the most confirmed cases, reaching 19,250 infected people and 530 dead, according to data provided by the government.
In number of infections, Peru is only surpassed by Brazil at the regional level. As to deceased, the country registers 16 for every million inhabitants, while Ecuador has 30, Brazil 14, Chile 8, Colombia 4 and Argentina 3.
In the midst of this panorama, medical personnel have come out to protest the lack of supplies, to demand protective equipment, and to prepare the hospitals to face the pandemic. As an example of the situation, health professionals complain that even have worn single-use masks multiple times, since they only have three. That is why, they argue, that medical personnel in some hospital facilities have been infected.
Precariousness is evident in the hospital Mary Help of Christians of Lima, which is one of the most affected. There, staff protested Monday with posters to account for working conditions. “We as a hospital have capacity for only six corpses; daily we have been seeing 13 to 16 corpses crowded on the first floor ”, told Reuters agency, Daisy Aguirre, leader of the nurses union. From that hospital center, images showing bodies covered by a sheet in a corridor were filtered. This because of they only had six mortuary beds available.
Along the same lines, industry sources told Reuters that the corpse picking in time for incineration is becoming a problem, because the six crematoriums in Lima are already exceeding their capacity.
It is in this context that el Medical College of Peru requested this Wednesday to President Vizcarra and the health authorities that maintain containment measures that expire on Sunday. In his opinion, a large part of the infected persons became infected during the isolation period, as a result of the crowds in markets and banks.
The agency’s request occurs at times when, without specifying the method used for its projection, the government stated that the peak of the pandemic will occur on Sunday, just the day the quarantine expires.
As in other countries, Vizcarra is in the midst of a growing pressure to relax measures in order to revive the economy. In this context, the president – who did not offer his daily conference on the subject this Wednesday – pointed out that an eventual extension of the state of emergency is a joint decision involving various institutions and that the decision is permanently evaluated. In the country, compulsory social immobilization governs from 18:00 to 04:00.
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