The outbreak of COVID-19 has caused 13 deaths so far this month in the province of Ciego de Ávila, which has the island’s highest incidence rate of positive cases of coronavirus per 100,000 inhabitants during the last 15 days.
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel warned this Tuesday about the lethality of the virus in that province, which has had five consecutive days with reports of deaths from the disease, “something that had not happened in our country for a long time,” said the president, quoted by the Agencia Cubana de Noticias news agency.
Deaths resulting from the pandemic in Cuba amounted to 118, after the death of another person in Ciego de Ávila, according to the Cuban health authorities’ report.
Muere otro avileño por coronavirus y los nuevos contagios en Cuba suman 48
The most recent victim of the pandemic on the island was 84 years old and his residence was in the Majagua municipality, one of the five demarcations of that central province that reported cases yesterday. The details of the evolution of the deceased are described in the report issued by the Ministry of Public Health (MINSAP).
Ciego de Ávila presents a complex epidemiological situation, with reports of contagions in its 10 municipalities during this outbreak, reported the governor of the province, Tomás Alexis Martín, adding that until this Tuesday there were 180 hospitalized patients with COVID-19.
Martín explained that they currently have 143 areas under quarantine measures. Meanwhile, five events of local transmission of the virus remain open; the two most worrying are in the main health institutions of the municipalities of Ciego de Ávila and Morón.
He said that 1,500 capacities for the isolation of contacts, contacts of contacts and suspects, were enabled, given the sustained number of contagions.
Last week the Cuban government sent a group of experts to the province led by the national director of Science and Technological Innovation of the Ministry of Public Health, Dr. Ileana Morales, to help control the spread of the coronavirus.
Among the measures directed by the health authorities was the application of doses of Nasalferon (nasal version of Interferon alfa 2-b) to all workers in health institutions.
Nasal interferon to be administered to all health workers in Ciego de Ávila
“In the world, along with the elderly, health personnel have been one of the sectors most affected by the pandemic and where high numbers of deaths have been registered,” Morales said.
She stressed that in Cuba it is “our moral obligation” to take all possible actions to protect their lives.
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