The number of cases of the omicron variant of covid-19 detected in Cuba rose to 29 this Friday, health authorities reported, which also specified that of the total infected, nine have presented mild symptoms and 20 have not manifested any.
“In all cases, the pertinent focus control has been carried out, detecting an average of 22 contacts for each patient: all have been studied and are kept under clinical epidemiological surveillance,” said the Minister of Public Health, José Angel Portal Miranda, during a meeting with the main leaders of the country.
The authorities did not specify whether all those infected with omicron on the island are imported, although they pointed out that according to a study of autochthonous cases carried out by the Pedro Kourí Institute of Tropical Medicine, the delta variant continues to cause the most infections nationwide.
The Cuban virologist based in Brazil, Amílcar Pérez-RiverolHe pointed out as a danger in the current scenario the limited existence of N-95 masks, “which together with the shortage of basic supplies that causes crowds, represents an important engine of contagion.”
“I can’t stop saying it, but we keep doing concerts as if we don’t know what’s going on in the world”
“Many people in Cuba do not have efficient means of individual protection. If it was fatal with delta, with omicron it is worse,” he warned.
“I do not stop saying it, but we continue doing concerts as if we do not know what is happening in the world. Minsap (Ministry of Public Health), please give the alert voice. We have to stop everything now,” he asked in his account from Twitter the chemist Daniel G. Rivera, professor at the University of Havana, and presented in the official media as one of the creators of the Cuban anti-COVID vaccine Soberana 02.
Although the tweet was later deleted, it can still be read elsewhere what did he post later: “I insist, I love them, but I am against concerts.”
In this Friday’s meeting, Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz called not to be confident and to “strictly comply” with the measures that the Government has designed, as outlined. the official press.
In addition, given the “slight increase” in the number of infections that has occurred in recent days, Marrero Cruz “insisted on the importance of the country maintaining control” over the epidemic in order to advance “in resuscitating life. economic and social of the nation “.
For its part, Portal Miranda offered some data on the pandemic and said that, at the end of the last week there was “a decrease in the intensity of the transmission of 75% in relation to the end of the month of November. A scenario that, as indicated , has been characterized “by a reduction in autochthonous cases and an increase in imported ones.”
“Many people in Cuba do not have efficient means of individual protection. If it was fatal with delta, with omicron it is worse”
He highlighted that there are eight territories where cases have increased compared to the previous week, among which the special municipality of Isla de la Juventud stands out, with 24 more, and Matanzas, with eight. In that period, Holguín, Camagüey and Isla de la Juventud accounted for 49% of diagnoses, reporting a figure of 230 new patients.
Portal Miranda reported that precisely in the provinces of Holguín and Camagüey were where the highest levels of transmission were registered for the month of December and pointed out that it is in these two territories where more than 43% of confirmed cases are concentrated so far this year. month.
Faced with the expansion of the new variant worldwide, which has been classified by the World Health Organization as “of concern”, Portal Miranda proposed to modify some of the control measures that the Government has established and create new ones, which are they will be made public “once they are approved.”
The Ministry of Public Health reported this Saturday that 2,837 patients are admitted, of them 2,181 are suspects, 224 under surveillance and 432 “confirmed active.” In the last hours, a total of “20,040 samples were made, of which 125 were positive” and three deaths from the disease were registered for a cumulative 8,320 deaths since the pandemic began.
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