A health worker performs a covid-19 test on a woman, in Santiago, Chile, on March 30. Esteban Felix / AP
Chile is going through the worst moment of the pandemic, although 45% of the population, seven million people, has received at least one dose of the vaccine, according to data provided in recent hours by the Minister of Health, Enrique Paris.
The authorities have not reported how many of those infected have received any of the injections, but it is estimated that out of every 10 inoculated, between three and five could be infected and one could suffer a moderate to severe picture of the disease, explains the biostatistician of the University of Chile, Gabriel Cavada.
It is the information that has not clearly reached the population, according to various experts, who coincide in criticizing the government of Sebastián Piñera for an incorrect installation of risk and the triumphalism of the vaccination process.
"Only the positive aspects of the campaign have been highlighted and not the dangers that remain", analyzes the doctor Mauricio Canals, member of the ICOVID platform, an initiative led by the University of Chile, the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile and the Universidad de Concepción on the basis of official data.
This new wave of covid-19 has been more violent than the first that had its peak in Chile in June 2020. This time the number of daily cases has been exceeded: from 6,938 on June 14, it has reached more of 8,000 (8,112 last Friday), although a record has also been broken in the number of tests carried out (20,000 to 73,000 on both dates, respectively).
"But last year it took us three months to climb the hill and now we have reached the same level, even higher, in just one month," Cavada analyzes.
"We are raising it too fast, three times more, according to the graphs," adds the academic from the School of Public Health of the University of Chile.
Piñera referred this Monday to the criticisms that hit his government, which faces a complex health scenario, but also a political one.
In just five weeks, approval to discharge the pandemic fell 20 points, according to the Cadem survey (from 58% to 38%).
"We have never underestimated this pandemic," said the president, at the start of the annual campaign against influenza.
"We have always asked our compatriots to provide personal care," added the president, who mentioned that about 15 million Chileans today are serving a quarantine.
Without ICU beds
The Chilean Executive managed to stock up on vaccines like no other country in the region and, thanks to its strong primary health system, it has been able to deploy a speedy campaign and one of the most successful in the world.
Chile has not been able to stop the contagion: it has already exceeded one million infected in these 13 months (the total population of the country is about 19 million) and there are 2,883 admitted to the Intensive Care Units (ICU), as never before, with only 164 critical beds available nationwide.
This situation is explained by a series of factors, such as low traceability: half of the people spend more than three days contaminating it before the case is known by the authorities.
“In addition, the interventions have not been made before the phenomena occur.
What good is the closure of borders if the variants are already within?
It practically no longer makes sense, ”says Canals.
The member of the ICOVID platform explains that the vaccination process, although it has been rapid, was not able to produce effects on the new outbreak of covid-19 in Chile.
The start of mass vaccination was on February 3 and the second dose started on March 3.
Fifteen days later - on March 18 - some degree of immunity was only reached for the groups over 70 years of age and something for those over 60.
“The immune status, therefore, has not come to cover the population that is transmitting the disease, which is between 30 and 60 years old.
It is a group that is just beginning to have a little immunity these days ”, Canals explains.
List the factors that would have caused the new wave.
“After the summer, in March the activities began with practically no restrictions.
Quarantines were never effective, population mobility increased considerably ”.
With the opening of schools and shopping centers, in his opinion, the wrong message was delivered to the public.
We get sicker and younger
As a result of the vaccine, the age of the people who occupy critical beds has been changing.
Today, according to official data, those admitted between 40 and 49 (469 cases) exceed those over 70 (378 cases).
The youngest (359 admitted under the age of 39) are just below the oldest.
But the fatality has not decreased and remains at 2.4%.
Rather, what has happened in Chile is that covid-19 has begun to look for susceptibles in other groups.
A month ago, for example, around 80% of those who died were over 70 years old, but that number has been decreasing.
"What is extremely worrying, then, is that the fatality component in those under 60 years of age has been growing," says Cavada.
This fact threatens to collapse the hospital occupation: "Unlike the first wave of 2020, when younger people with severe courses of the disease enter the ICU, they spend more time in the complex bed and the ventilator."
Doctor Canals has "the hope that now the lethality curve should be broken": "We have 15% of the population with real immunity and a significant increase."
He is encouraged by some signs, such as the decrease in ICUs of patients older than 70 and even 60. "This suggests that the effect of the vaccines is beginning," says the academic.
But it is an uncertain picture.
The projections of the biostatistician Cavada speak of a growth space for another 300,000 infections, 1.3 million in total.
About the time in which these infections would occur, he explains: “As we climb this hill too fast, my hope is that the descent will be quick.
But I have no evidence to ensure it. "
It also analyzes the figures for those who died from covid-19.
Throughout the pandemic, Chile has confirmed 23,677 deaths.
"In an unfortunate scenario, only those confirmed with PCR could reach a figure between 30,000 to 35,000," explains the epidemiologist.
Meanwhile, probable deaths without PCR confirmation –31,151, according to the Epidemiological Report of the Ministry of Health–, “could reach about 45,000”, he assures.
That is, almost a third more deaths from this health crisis.
Although Cavada explains that there is no clarity about the time in which this process could take place, he leans towards "the next two months, given the speed of the infections."
"I would prefer this transit to be slow and less painful, but I think it will be quick and cruel," says the academic from the School of Public Health of the University of Chile.
Considering that at the end of July the pediatric population could have been vaccinated, between the ages of five and 15, herd immunity would only be reached at the end of 2021, that is, in eight more months.
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