BOGOTA (Reuters) – The Americas are not behaving like a region with an increasingly serious COVID-19 outbreak, the director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) warned Wednesday.
This increase in the number of infections is alarming but not surprising given the relaxed restrictions used to prevent the transmission of viruses, PAHO director Carissa Etienne said at a weekly press conference, adding that vaccination will not be enough to stop this wave of contagion. stop.
“Highly transferable variants are spreading, and social distance measures are not being enforced as strictly as before,” Etienne said. “We are not acting like a region in the midst of an worsening outbreak.”
More people in the region have been infected with COVID-19 in the past seven days than in most weeks last year, Etienne noted, while the number of weekly deaths in 2020 is greater than any week.
More than 1.3 million people in America became infected and nearly 36,000 died last week, PAHO said.
“There are simply not enough vaccines available to protect everyone in the countries at greatest risk,” said Etienne. “We need to stop the transfer by any means possible with the tools we have on hand.”
It will take a few weeks for vaccine stock to normalize, Etienne said, adding that countries should continue to administer the AstraZeneca vaccine as side effects are very rare.
Leaders at every level can play a critical role in tightening up measures at the first sign of increasing infections, she said.
“We have noticed a marked relaxation in the implementation of public health measures,” said COVID-19 incident manager Sylvain Aldighieri. Regardless of the virus variant, COVID-19 has the potential to overwhelm health systems, he said.
Countries with significant increases in cases should consider lockdown measures, but if outbreaks are already visible, it may be too late, said PAHO director of health emergencies, Ciro Ugarte.
“It is clearly necessary to consider these measures,” said Ugarte, adding that such measures should be local and of very limited duration.
If COVID-19 isn’t monitored around the world, a worst-case scenario exists in which a new vaccine-resistant variant emerges, PAHO sub-director Jarbas Barbosa said.
Reporting by Julia Symmes Cobb Editing by Bill Berkrot