With half of Brazil's deaths, Europe bets on lockdowns against 3rd wave
Under new lockdown, Paris faces crowded hospitals once again in the coronavirus pandemic
France has become the last European country to again take strict measures against the spread of covid-19, known as a lockdown.
The governments of France and other countries, such as Italy, Germany and the Netherlands, see signs of the emergence of a third wave of the disease and have started to close their doors, prepare for it or postpone reopening.
Currently, the coronavirus kills about 10 people per 1 million inhabitants in Brazil every day. In the European Union, that daily rate is almost 5 deaths per million. Both are on an upward trajectory, but more sharply in Brazil.
If we consider the data for the largest countries in the European bloc, Poland leads with 7.6 deaths per million each day, followed by Italy (6.3), France (3.9), Spain (2.5) and Germany (2.2).
The situation in Paris is particularly worrying with almost 1,200 people in intensive care in hospitals, more than at the peak of the second wave in November, according to French Health Minister Olivier Véran.
As of this Friday (19/3), non-essential trade will be closed in 16 French regions, where almost 21 million people live, including the capital, Paris.
But the measures this time will not be as rigid as in the previous lockdown, said Prime Minister Jean Castex. People will be allowed to exercise outdoors, schools will remain open, but trips between cities can only be made for essential reasons, for example.
The new lockdown in France was announced a few days after a similar announcement in Italy.
Currently, schools, shops and restaurants are closed in more than half of Italian territory, including the two most populous regions, where Rome and Milan are located.
Residents will be required to stay at home, except for work, health or other essential reasons.
The term lockdown does not refer to the same set of measures, but it ended up becoming synonymous with rigid measures. But there are different levels, and each country or region adopts its own restrictions, with different schedules and sectors affected in different ways.
According to a survey by Unesco (a branch of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), currently 29 countries adopt partial or total closure of schools.
In Europe, countries like Portugal and Ireland have educational institutions completely closed, and Germany, Italy and Holland, partially open. On the other hand, the United Kingdom, France and Spain do not adopt restrictions.
This may change with advancing cases on the continent. Like the differences between countries, schools will remain open in French regions under lockdown, but will be closed in Italian regions that have restricted the movement of people.
"I am aware that today's restrictions will have consequences for the education of your children, the economy and the mental health of everyone," said Prime Minister of Italy, Mario Draghi. "But they are necessary to prevent a worsening of the situation that would require even stricter measures."
In most Italian regions, "hospitals and especially intensive care units are already overloaded," the health studies center Gimbe warned this week, according to the AFP news agency.
Other countries on the continent are facing advances. Poland recorded almost 21,000 new daily cases in mid-month, the highest number since November.
Germany recorded a rapid increase in infections among school-age children, mainly with new variants of the coronavirus, such as the discovery in the United Kingdom.
German authorities fear an "exponential" increase in cases and, by extension, overcrowding in hospitals. "It is very possible that during Easter we have a situation similar to the one we had before Christmas, with a very high number of cases, many serious cases and deaths and crowded hospitals," said Lars Schaade, vice president of the Robert Koch Institute for Diseases. Infectious.
Even under strict measures, Germany and the Netherlands, for example, have registered increases in cases and have started to reconsider the timetable set for gradually reopening the economy.
Lockdown around the world and Bolsonaro's reactions
A survey by the University of Oxford, in the United Kingdom, points out that the two regions with the most countries adopting strict measures for the circulation of people are Europe and Latin America.
In Latin America, six countries have schools that are completely closed: Mexico, Bolivia, Venezuela, Honduras, Panama and the Dominican Republic.
Brazil is part of the group of countries with partial opening, alongside others such as Chile, Argentina and Uruguay. Only Nicaragua, Peru, Suriname and Cuba have educational institutions completely open in the region.
Sign signals mandatory mask use in Brussels, Belgium
Brazil is currently facing the biggest health and hospital collapse in its history, according to the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), and the trend is getting worse.
Amid the scenario of crowded hospitals and lack of medicines and health professionals, both the pressure for lockdowns in the country and the criticisms of President Jair Bolsonaro to this policy are growing.
Bolsonaro, in fact, appealed to the Supreme Federal Court to overturn trade closures in Bahia, the Federal District and Rio Grande do Sul. He argues that this type of measure depends on the approval of the Legislature, and not just pass by decrees of governors.
In a live broadcast on social media on Thursday (18/3), he again criticized isolation measures, classified the World Health Organization (WHO) as "discredited" and said that the body does not recommend lockdown as a measure of containment of the pandemic - which is incorrect.
"Staying at home is a nice thing, who does not want to be on vacation at home," the president quipped, against his peers around the world.
"I always preached vertical isolation back there. Special care for the elderly, with whom they have comorbidities and the obese. And the rest, they have to return to normality," he said, again contradicting evidence pointed out by authorities such as the Israeli epidemiologist Gabriel Barbash. , former director-general of the Israeli Ministry of Health, who in a recent interview with BBC News Brasil said that "there is no doubt" about the effectiveness of lockdowns in combating covid-19.
At various times, the Brazilian president criticized those who have sought to work from home to reduce the upward curve of contamination. "It's very easy for me to join the lockdown. 'Confinement, close everything.' It's cool, it's politically correct. I would be betraying my conscience if I acted that way."
Again defending alternative treatments that are not recommended by the international scientific community, the president even made a joke and reproduced sounds of suffocation emitted by people with shortness of breath due to the disease. "The appeal I make to those who are against it ... No problem. If you start to feel a strange business, follow Minister Mandetta's recipe. Go home and, when you are there ... (Bolsonaro starts making choking sounds) ) with shortness of breath, then you go to the hospital ".
Shortage of vaccines
Another factor that aggravates the situation of the pandemic is that both the European Union and Brazil have not yet managed to advance vaccination and feel the positive effects in reducing deaths, as was felt in Israel, the United Kingdom and the United States, for example.
The problem was further aggravated in the European continent because several countries suspended the application of the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine for fear of blood clots as a side effect, but the suspicions were unfounded, according to the European Medicines Agency (a kind of Anvisa from the block) .
In Brazil, 4.6% of the population has already received the first dose. Italy, France and Germany vaccinated 8.3%, and the United Kingdom, 38%. The most advanced country in this regard is Israel, with 59.5% of the inhabitants immunized with at least one dose.
Among these countries mentioned, Brazil has the highest daily death rate per 1 million inhabitants (9.8), followed by Italy (6.3), France (3.9), Germany (2.2), Israel ( 1.7) and the United Kingdom (1.6).
Brazil was the only one among them to not adopt a national lockdown at any time. On the other hand, all the countries compared above started vaccination while strict measures were in place, which further reduced the spread of the disease.
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