Cuba reaches 500-COVID-related-death mark

HAVANA, Cuba, Apr 16 (ACN) Since March 11, 2020, when COVID-19 was introduced in Cuba, 500 people have died due to this disease, which in recent months has become difficult to control in the third outbreak affecting 190 countries in the world.

Dr. Francisco Durán, national epidemiology director of the Ministry of Public Health (Minsap), in his usual appearance broadcast by Cuban Television, also informed that so far in April and up to the end of yesterday, 15,172 positive cases of SARS-CoV-2 were diagnosed in the country, with an average of 1,011 per day, and 79 people died from this cause.

The official specified that in the last 24 hours 1,040 people were diagnosed with COVID-19 in the country's molecular biology laboratories and nine died due to complications of the virus, as they suffered from other comorbidities.

He warned once again about the importance of reinforcing all the measures adopted and called on the people's participation to cut the transmission of the epidemic, whose indicators are unfavorable and the disease has become more lethal.

Of the 91,448 cases confirmed since March last year, 4,750 remain active and 4,677 of them are in stable clinical evolution.

At the close of this Thursday, 73 patients remained in intensive care, of which 30 were critical and 43 serious, which shows the complexity of the transmission for several weeks, warned the experienced epidemiologist.

He called attention to the fact that 95% of those diagnosed yesterday (988) are contacts of those previously infected and a total of 85,955 (93.9%).

He warned about the importance of using nasobuco correctly, keeping a physical distance and frequent washing of hands and surfaces, considering that asymptomatic people are more prone to infect others with this virus of which there are five genetic variants and six mutational ones in Cuba.

By the end of yesterday, 49.9% (519) of those diagnosed were totally asymptomatic and 51.1% of the total number of COVID-19 positives had already accumulated, with 46,750 people who had no symptoms at the time of testing, said Dr. Durán.

During the day, 1,021 medical discharges were made and 86,142 patients have already recovered (94.2%) although they are not exempt from having a group of sequels.

This Thursday, 119 children under 20 years of age were diagnosed, 106 of them in pediatric ages and 11,328 children, young people and adolescents have been diagnosed with COVID-19.

Also included in the report of the last day are six one-year-old children, four from Havana, one from Matanzas and another from Pinar del Río, and they already add up to 596 infants diagnosed in the course of the pandemic.

Cuba currently has 41 active events, of which 23 are community and 18 are institutional, and Havana, with 13, is the territory with the highest number.

Many times the institutional events cause workers to carry the transmission to the community, warned Durán.

He also explained that 22,418 samples were processed for COVID-19 diagnosis in all territories, including the special municipality Isla de la Juventud.

The figures are decreasing in almost all provinces, while Havana, Matanzas, Santiago de Cuba, Granma, and Sancti Spiritus, maintain high numbers of infected people, he said.

Although in some territories the COVID-19 positive cases are decreasing, Durán called not to trust and to continue strengthening the measures adopted by the country's top management to control the pandemic that only yesterday killed 12,895 people in the world and more than 17 million remain active with the virus.