Hospitals are overrun as oxygen supplies are exhausted while the COVID-19 infections in Manaus, Brazil continue to increase. With more than 207,000 deaths and 8.3 million reported cases in Brazil to date, the country is finding difficulties in keeping up with the unprecedented spread of the pandemic. (Written by Nicholas Tjandra) Looking at the severity of the first wave of COVID-19, many believed a second wave was impossible in Brazil’s Amazon. The second crisis has forced families and friends of patients to look towards private suppliers for oxygen. With an exponentially growing need for hospital beds, some are even resorting to being airlifted to other states, where they may find beds available. With limited capacity in Manaus, many are dying from asphyxiation. The conditions have only deteriorated as it is reported to have approximately 80 confirmed COVID-19 deaths each day as of May 2020, with a casualty rate only second to the USA according to data from John Hopkins University. “Manaus is lost,” notes Orellana, who also claims the city is an open-air laboratory in which “where all types of negligence and inhumanity are possible” which is resulting in people dying at home in the absence of medical supplies Arthur Virgílio Neto stated in a video message that, "We are doing our best, but I tell you, it's still very little in [the] face of the oncoming barbarism" and that, "We cannot be silent. We need all possible help." This was said in May. Virgílio, at the age of 75, left the office following his term end eight months later.
The chaos in the Amazon is adding to the pressure on the mayor who has sent an urgent appeal to then-President Donald Trump and other world leaders as well as Bolsonaro, his history of not taking COVID-19 seriously and his baseless insistence that the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine is effective against COVID-19. President Bolsonaro now faces a backlash over Brazil's bungled national vaccination program. In addition to that, Bolsonaro has decided to utilize the Brazilian Air Force planes to deliver emergency oxygen supplies. It is reported that the Brazilian Defense Ministry has made 45 flights in the week after the oxygen crisis began, meaning more than 2,600 cylinders are being transported to Manaus as well as a dozen oxygen generators. However, this will not excuse Bolsonaro from his deeply negligent response to the pandemic in Brazil as the medical community sees it. Bolsonaro has "no clue" about COVID-19, Lacerda says. "People around him repeat whatever he says," he adds, "it is the craziest thing I've ever seen." and "The president always gives excuses: 'It was the mayor's fault. It was the governor's fault.' It was because they were not using chloroquine," claims Lacerda is an infectious disease specialist at the Dr. Heitor Vieira Dourado Tropical Medicine Foundation in Manaus and one of the 240,000 people who have so far caught the coronavirus in Manaus and the surrounding state. He is now recovering. "I wouldn't know how to live if I was responsible for these deaths that are so cruel and nasty," he said, in a message to NPR this week. Works Cited: - https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/15/americas/brazil-manaus-coronavirus-crisis-intl/in dex.html - https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n394#:~:text=Read%20our%20latest%20c overage%20of%20the%20coronavirus%20outbreak&text=Hospitals%20in%20th e%20Brazilian%20Amazon,second%20time%20in%20mid%2DJanuary.&text=Ar ound%2080%20confirmed%20covid%2D19,2021%20that%20number%20exceede d%20100. - https://www.npr.org/2021/01/22/959567446/coronavirus-crisis-gets-even-worse-in brazilian-amazon-city-of-manaus - https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/1/25/doctors-fear-manaus-covid-crisis-coul d-spread-across-brazil - https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/1/25/doctors-fear-manaus-covid-crisis-coul d-spread-across-brazil
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Welcome to our blog, Medquity!Here we will post extra articles on health disparities to display the profound health inequities in our healthcare system. These are updated every other weekend, so check back regularly! Archives
July 2021
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