COVID-19: Brazil now has more young than old patients in ICUs as condition worsens

The health officials in Brazil have warned that more and more younger patients are now landing in intensive care as April is shaping up to be Brazil’s darkest month yet in the coronavirus pandemic. Hospitals in Brazil are struggling as the patients and number of deaths reached a new record high. The Health Ministry has already cut its supply of vaccines thrice in the month of April as the country’s two biggest laboratories are facing supply constraints. According to the reports by Johns Hopkins University, Brazil has a total of 13,482,543 cases with 353,293 fatalities. 

According to the Brazilian ICU Project, the number of people aged 39 or below rose drastically to more than 11,000, which is 52.2 per cent of the total in the month of March. This was a hike by 14.6 per cent of total ICU patients during the early phases of the pandemic. Also, this was an increase of 45 per cent from September through February.  

Current situation in Brazil

The same data suggests that the country’s seven-day rolling average has increased to 2,820 deaths per day, compared with the global average of 10,608 per day. Health experts are blaming President Jair Bolsonaro for refusing to impose restrictions to prevent the deadly virus from spreading. Claudio Maierovitch, former head of Brazil’s health regulator said, “The big problem is that Brazil did not look for alternatives when it had the chance”. He added, “When several countries were placing their bets, signing contracts with different suppliers, the Brazilian government didn’t even have vaccination on its agenda”. 

According to the reports by AP, Denise Garrett, vice president of the Sabin Vaccine Institute said that she despaired at the government strategy. She further added that Brazil has been far Latin America’s immunization front-runner. Also, she had not seen it in the same league as the region’s other countries. Considering the problems in vaccine development and distribution, “it’s definitely not a good idea to put all your eggs in one basket”, she said.

The Intensive Care Units for COVID-19 patients in most Brazilian states have more than 90 per cent occupancy. Also, 7 out of every 10 hospitals in the country fear running out of oxygen the next few days, reported the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo. Brazil started vaccinating its citizens on January 11 and it has so far vaccinated 29.5 million people.

(Image Credits: Unsplash)