Argentina announces the start of the fourth wave of Covid-19 | Globalism

In the past seven days, there were 33,989 cases, 92.6% more from 17,646 in the previous week. It was 182% more than two weeks ago. In the past four weeks, infections have increased by 305.2%, from 8,387 to currently 33,989.

Today we started Argentina The fourth wave of Covid-19 that comes to us is in a situation completely different from its predecessors,” the Minister of Health, Carla Vizzotti, noted at the opening of the Federal Health Council that included the health ministers of Argentina’s 24 provinces in the city of Patagonia in Villa La Angostura.

“The picture of vaccination allows for a new phase of the pandemic,” the minister stressed.

“There is no possibility of a new confinement”, Vizzotti confirmed, ruling out the possibility of new restrictions like those in place in 2020, when Argentina The quarantine was the longest and strictest in the world for 233 days.

“Cases will increase. Therefore, we need to move forward with vaccination so that it does not translate into hospitalization or death,” Minister Vizzotti said.

Acquired Immune Deficiency

Due to the low number of cases during the summer, the Argentina Stop publishing daily reports, and adopt weekly method as of April 17th. However, since then, the infection curve has increased with decreasing temperature, just over a month ahead of winter.

The drop in temperature occurred in parallel with three factors experts point to as the main factors explaining the new wave: a highly contagious omicron variant, relaxation in preventive care and decreased acquired immunity, whether through infections or vaccinations.

“During the summer, the omicron variant infected a large part of the population, bringing temporary immunity.. At the same time, advance vaccination, strengthening immunity through vaccinations. Now, months later, these two preventative measures are starting to lose their effectiveness. Hence the importance of the third dose,” explains Roberto Debag, president of the Latin American Association of Pediatric Infectious Diseases to RFI.

Although the vaccination campaign reached 88% of the population with a single dose and 80% with the full regimen, it has been stagnant for months, especially in the 47.6% booster dose.

‘The main reason for the increase in cases is Slow booster dose. We know that just two doses is not enough for the omicron variant,” notes Eduardo Lopez, an infectious disease specialist at Children’s Hospital of Buenos Aires and director of pediatric infectious diseases at Buenos Aires Medical School.

Despite the increase in infections, the bed occupancy rate in intensive care units remained stable at 41.2% and the number of deaths decreased in the past week from 76 to 47, a decrease of 40%.

“This indicates that we are starting a new wave, but in a new wave of mild cases,” noted the country’s Minister of Health, Fernán Quiros.

Quiros predicts “It will not be the same as in the previous waves where cases rose, then hospitalizations increased and days later patients died. This time, the vast majority of cases will be mild thanks to vaccination and acquired immunity.”

The current protocol of the Argentine Ministry of Health stipulates that tests are carried out only in the elderly and in groups at risk. Therefore, experts calculate that the 92.6% increase in cases over the past week, although high, is an underestimate.

in the capital Argentinawhich governs another test protocol, open to all sectors, the The increase in cases was 128% in the past seven days.

Since the beginning of the epidemic, it has been Argentina It had 9.135 million infections, of which 127,776 died out of a total of 47 million people. In 87% of new cases, the omicron variant predominates across subline BA.2.