Brazil, hit by the Covid-19 variant, surpasses the US in daily cases and deaths

The average number of seven-day daily deaths in Brazil has risen to 1,573, while the rate in the United States drops (to 1,566 a day) amid fewer cases and more vaccinations, according to Our World in Data University Oxford. The United States peaked at just over 3,400 daily deaths in January.

As many countries put the worst of the pandemic behind them, Brazil is facing one of its worst humanitarian crises as deaths and infections increase, recording nearly 1,000 new cases every 20 minutes last week, more than 70,000. per day.

Public health specialists blame part of the blame for the rapid spread of the P.1 strain from the Amazonian city of Manaus, which studies have shown to be more contagious and better able to reinfect people than previous versions of the disease. Deaths have also increased as Brazil’s health care system struggled to cope, meaning patients who could have been rescued were left to die in the hospital’s chaotic corridors or, in the worst cases, drowned. for lack of oxygen.

There are currently hundreds of new variants of Covid-19 in Brazil, according to researchers, who warned that other more dangerous versions could emerge when the disease is strengthened and mutated for longer, threatening to undermine the progress of others. countries against the pandemic.

“It sounds like a nightmare,” said Mohamed Parrini, chief executive of Moinhos de Vento Hospital in the southern city of Porto Alegre, which has been competing to turn other wards into makeshift ICUs. “The saddest thing is when you start to see that the people around you are also intubated: the husbands of the people, the spouses and uncles of the employees.”

Like many doctors across the country, Parrini said he saw more younger patients (many in their 30s and 40s) than during Brazil’s first wave of cases in the middle of last year. Researchers are still trying to understand why.

Covid-19 has killed more than 260,000 people in Brazil, including more than 10,000 last week. This puts the country behind the United States alone, which has more than 525,000 dead.

Public health specialists have also blamed President Jair Bolsonaro for not getting more vaccines and for minimizing the danger of the disease. Recently, the former army captain told Brazilians to return to work and “stop complaining.”

Brazil has only inoculated about 4% of its population. This means that cases and deaths are likely to remain in Brazil for the next few months, epidemiologists say.

The United States, Brazil and India have led the total number of daily deaths per pandemic month, but the first, when the virus began its deadly march from China to South Korea and Europe.

Public hospitals in the capital Brasilia and more than 20 of the 26 Brazilian states have already reached full capacity or are about to run out of beds in their ICU wards. Hospitals in Brasilia, the Amazon and the south have resorted to renting refrigerated containers to store corpses after the morgues of the site have been filled. Meanwhile, cemeteries in some cities like Campo Grande, in the midwest, have excavated parking lots to leave more space for graves.

As a proportion of its population of 213 million people, Brazil has suffered fewer deaths so far than the US, as well as Mexico, Peru and several European nations. But the speed of Brazil’s recent wave of fatalities – and the fact that it is contrary to the global trend – has caused deep concern about the country’s fate, as well as the potential of the P.1 strain to wreak havoc similar to all the region.

A recent study showed that P.1 was 1.4 to 2.2 times more contagious than previously found versions of the virus in Brazil and 25% to 61% more able to reinfect people.

Researchers believe P.1 first appeared in Manaus in early November, and by January, the new strain was already responsible for 85% of new Covid-19 infections in the city.

Chaos soon followed. After dozens of patients drowned in Manaus in January after a city-wide oxygen shortage, a convoy of Venezuelan trucks made a 26-hour journey south through the rainforest to supply supplies. Prosecutors have also investigated reports last month indicating that intubated patients in the region were tied to beds after a shortage of sedatives.

Although the infection rate and the number of daily deaths have shown signs of falling in the state of Amazon in recent weeks, other southern states are facing darker days although the P.1 continues extending. São Paulo, Brazil’s largest and richest city, has asked volunteer doctors to help relieve depleted medical staff, as ICU employment rates reach 80% for the first time.

Brazil began its vaccination campaign on January 17, but has proceeded slowly. There have been mixed signs about how Brazil’s main vaccine, Chinese CoronaVac shot and other Covid-19 vaccines will work against P.1. The Butantan Institute and Fiocruz, Brazilian research centers that produce the CoronaVac vaccine and the Oxford-AstraZeneca shot, respectively, said the two studies show that both are effective against P.1.

A lab study this week showed that Pfizer Inc

the vaccine was able to neutralize P.1. However, another small study showed this month that the plasma of people vaccinated five months ago with CoronaVac “could not efficiently neutralize” the strain.

Write to Samantha Pearson to [email protected] and Luciana Magalhaes to [email protected]