06/15/2020 - 16:06
- Clarín.com
- Cities
Over the weekend the Detectar program made its way to La Boca, one of the most critical neighborhoods in terms of housing in Buenos Aires. It is estimated that there are more than 300 tenements. Places where up to 30 families live, sharing all the common spaces - patios, hallways, kitchens - and even bathrooms. Many times a couple of bathrooms for dozens of families. Under these circumstances, as also occurs in towns and settlements, overcrowding plays a fundamental role in the spread of the coronavirus.
According to official information, 55 homes were visited over the weekend and 52 people were tested and identified as close contacts of cases already diagnosed as positive for coronavirus. Precisely the idea of Detect, carried out by the governments of the Nation and City, is to locate people who may be infected or those who present symptoms early.
In these search for "door to door" cases, social organizations and neighborhood networks play a fundamental role. In the case of La Boca, the people of "La Boca resist and propose" had been warning about the need for swabs because the virus had already entered the tenements and also in two settlements -Lamadrid and El Triángulo- , both located below the highway. As of Sunday, 25 cases have been detected in El Triángulo and 5 in Lamadrid . "The tenements must have specific protocols, they are not families that inhabit a building. They have to be identified as a unit, because families share everything inside a tenement," they say from the movement.
In those coronavirus positive households, governments are ensuring the provision of food and cleaning supplies. But this help does not reach every home, so the wandering of the neighbors between the dining rooms and the picnic areas is also a matter of concern. Something that was evident in towns and settlements, with the contagion - and the death - of neighborhood referents who are in charge of these sites of assistance to neighbors.
205 households were surveyed among the three neighborhoods where the Detectar program reached, and 414 neighbors were swabbed. So far, 163 positives and 216 negatives are known. In the coming days, the operation will continue through Constitución and Barracas; in both neighborhoods, in the last days, the greatest number of positive cases was detected. And as the program adds neighborhoods, the devices remain working in the territory. "The following points will be selected according to the evolution of infections," reported from the Ministry of Health.
The figures in the neighborhoods. In La Boca (Saturday and Sunday) 55 homes were visited and there were 52 Hispanic patients (4 positive, 13 negative, 35 pending results). In Flores (June 10 to 12) 66 homes were visited, there were 175 swabs. Here 35% were positive. In Balvanera, the first formal neighborhood outside of the tests carried out in towns and settlements, 84 homes were visited. There were 187 swabs and 56% of positive cases.
