Coronavirus: Chile extends its health alert due to the uncertainty of the scenario in China

The Minister of Health of Chile, Ximena Aguilera, reported this Wednesday the extension until next March of the health alert for fear of a resurgence of the Covid-19 coronavirus "due to the uncertainty of the epidemiological scenario presented by China", a country that presents a strong rebound in cases after relaxing its strict "covid zero" policy.

In this way, the decree that mobilizes resources to face the pandemic and that ended on December 31, will continue in force for three more months.

As confirmed by the portfolio, the measure is adopted preventively "due to the uncertainty of the epidemiological scenario that China presents at this time."

"The situation has also drawn the attention of the World Health Organization (WHO), which said it was "very concerned about the changing situation in China with the increase in reports of serious cases," the ministry added in a statement. .

The Chinese government announced this Monday that as of January 8 it will reopen its borders and eliminate the need for quarantine in a new step in the relaxation of the restrictions imposed by the coronavirus pandemic.

These decisions were implemented despite a severe outbreak of cases: last week, due to the appearance of more contagious subvariants of the Omicron strain, the authorities estimated that 37 million people were infected in a single day, a figure much higher than the record of 4 million infected registered in January this year.

For its part, Chile presented a variation of 15% in the last week of the year with respect to new confirmed cases, while in the last 14 days it was 12 percent, reported the local media Emol.

This Wednesday, 5,517 infections were registered, with a positivity rate of 18.75% in the last 24 hours nationwide.

The total number of people diagnosed since the start of the pandemic -in March 2020- reached 5,020,409.

Of this total, 10,109 patients are in the active stage, considering an isolation of 5 days from the onset of symptoms or from the taking of the test, and the cases of recovered are 4,930,856.

Regarding deaths, according to official information, in the last 24 hours five were registered due to causes associated with Covid-19 and the total number of deaths amounts to 63,076.

The Minister of Health of Chile, Ximena Aguilera, reported this Wednesday the extension until next March of the health alert for fear of a resurgence of the Covid-19 coronavirus "due to the uncertainty of the epidemiological scenario presented by China", a country that presents a strong rebound in cases after relaxing its strict "covid zero" policy.