Open and close: the peculiar system that Venezuela also uses to combat the coronavirus pandemic

Alejandra Pataro

05/25/2021 11:45 AM

• Clarín.com

• World

Updated 05/25/2021 11:45 AM

One week of confinement.

One week of opening.

A week of closure and another of opening ... and so on.

Since June 2020, the Nicolás Maduro regime has applied in Venezuela a plan of strict and short quarantines, followed by short and controlled reopening, in what they call

the "7 + 7 Plan"

against the coronavirus.

The Argentine government's decision to "close" for 9 days to curb the peak of infections and the wave of deaths in the country could be the beginning of a series of

intermittent closings and openings

throughout the winter, while trying to advance vaccination ;

a system that, if carried out, is reminiscent of the Venezuelan recipe of 7 + 7.

Maduro's plan

When Venezuela enters the seven days of closure, only workers in the health, food and security sector are allowed to circulate with their respective safe-conduct.

On days of easing,

ten economic sectors

can return to activity, but very specific time restrictions are set for each of them.

Nicolás Maduro in a government act today, in Caracas (Venezuela).

Photo: EFE

At the beginning, when the pandemic

struck the first blows

in the region, the week of restrictions was strictly adhered to. 

The radical week was applied rigorously, although exceptions were made in popular areas and it was modified on some

holidays.

But more than a year into the pandemic and in the midst of a second wave of coronavirus more severe than the first, the lack of rigor with which the restriction measures are applied

worries experts

, who see 7 + 7 as a

political plan

more than sanitary.

The third week of May 2021 was a radical quarantine in Caracas, but, in the streets, the flow of people was moderate and

the traffic normal.

A paramedic performs the medical report of a patient who is recovering at his home from covid-19, in Caracas.

Photo: EFE

Although it has been shown that paralyzing social activity

serves

to prevent infections, the 7 + 7 plan has been better implemented in areas where there are

better economic resources.

Political scientist Carmen Beatriz Fernández explained to DW that "as the socioeconomic ladder goes down, people

find it difficult to

accept confinement because they live day to day working informally, so the scope works in a very limited way and in middle class strata and tall".

The origins

It was on June 5 of last year when the executive vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, announced the particular system on TV.

"Seven days of work plus seven days of quarantine. But it must be a rigorous,

disciplined

quarantine,

" he ordered.

Without giving too many details, Rodríguez explained that the scheme had been adopted after learning about the recommendations of the Venezuelan Institute of Scientific Research and the government's Health Commission.

Recommendations that

nobody could check

.

A balance between health and economy

What Rodríguez did not say is that the system is very similar

to the Israeli model 

that proposes that people work in cycles of two weeks, with ten days of quarantine and four days of going to work and school;

better known as

the 10-4 system.

Mundo Uri Alon, professor of Biology and one of the researchers who developed the Israeli model, explained to BBC Mundo that it is "a

middle way

that offers a balance between health and economy."

The 10-4 model seeks to take advantage of the so-called

latency period of the virus,

the three days that it is believed that pass from when a person is infected until he can infect others.

Someone who was infected during their period of activity would not develop the symptoms or the ability to infect until they were

already back in the isolation phase

.

If the disease manifests, the confinement should be prolonged, which would prevent it from infecting others.

CASES

0.000.00000.000

per million inhab.

Xxxxx

DEATHS

00,0000,000

per million inhab.

Source:

Johns Hopkins

Chart:

Flourish

|

Infographic:

Clarín

But Israel is not Venezuela.

The first has practically defeated the coronavirus with a mass vaccination plan that is pioneering in the world, while in the region vaccines are scarce or are

reaching droppers.

National and international organizations point out that Venezuela is the country in Latin America with the lowest number of vaccinated people, a fact that the government

has not provided.

Nor is

there any

certainty about the number of vaccines arrived in the country.

Maduro ensures mass immunization of the population for August.

But the numbers of vaccines that the country would currently have received vary depending on who is speaking.

And they range from 930 thousand to almost a million and a half.

Venezuela has a population of

more than 28.5 million

inhabitants.

A health worker opens a package with several doses of Sputnik V, in Caracas.

Photo: dpa

Droplets

The opposition criticizes the regime for improvising and using drugs without any type of endorsement such as "carvativir", a "medicine" 

without scientific endorsement

made in the Caribbean country

These are drops that Maduro presented in January and that he said "neutralize covid-19 by 100% when used

every four hours

."

And that despite the criticism it received, they would continue to be used in certain parts of the country.

Presented as a powerful antiviral by the government,

Carvativir or Cimofenol

is actually a substance present in essential oils, such as those of oregano and thyme.

It can be used as a flavoring agent in food and different cosmetic products.

And it is used in homeopathic medicine.

CASES

0.000.00000.000

per million inhab.

Xxxxx

DEATHS

00,0000,000

per million inhab.

Source:

Johns Hopkins

Chart:

Flourish

|

Infographic:

Clarín

Another difference with Israel is that the Venezuelan government's 7-7 system does not fit with the estimated latency period of the virus, since one week is enough time for someone to

contract, incubate and transmit it.

Beyond the effectiveness of the plan (no one really knows the true numbers of infections and deaths in Venezuela), the country has a precarious health system and an

economy in ruins

, factors that do not contribute to fighting the pandemic.

The Pan American Health Organization considers Venezuela one of the

most vulnerable

countries in Latin America

in the

face of the pandemic and the National Hospital Survey, which is prepared annually by the organization Doctors for Health, detected important deficiencies in medical centers.

With

more than 2,400 deaths

from coronavirus and an average of between 800 to 1,000 infected daily, Venezuela is one of the countries with one of the lowest infection

rates

, with 54.3 infected per 100,000 inhabitants.

However, health experts suggest that the official figures are not the real ones, and that the cases could easily be

multiplied by 10.

Drafting Clarín

ap

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