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ARGENTINA | 20-04-2021 18:15

Second wave surge continues: Argentina reports close to 30,000 new cases

Argentina’s second wave coronavirus surge shows no sign of stopping – the Health Ministry confirmed close to 30,000 new cases on Tuesday, lifting total infections to more than 2.74 million since start of the pandemic.

Argentina’s second wave coronavirus surge shows no sign of stopping – the Health Ministry confirmed close to 30,000 new cases on Tuesday, lifting total infections to more than 2.74 million.

Government officials said that 29,145 new Covid-19 infections had been registered over the last 24 hours. Buenos Aires Province continues to be the hardest hit by the virus, recording 14,665 new cases. Of the total infections to date, the country’s most-populous region has recorded more than 1.18 million. The nation’s capital, Buenos Aires City, registered 3,345 new infections.

A total of 316 fatalities were recorded over the past 24 hours, with the death toll now at 59,792 since the pandemic began.

According to the Health Ministry, 4,366 patients are currently in intensive care units (ICUs), with occupancy reaching 64.9 percent nationwide and 75 percent in the AMBA region.

Buenos Aires City Health Minister Fernán Quirós, however, warned that some ICUs were reaching "above 95 percent" occupation. 

"The health system has come under stress very quickly and we must work to accompany it" before "a tremendously accelerated curve,” he said, speaking at a press conference on Tuesday morning.

Doctors, nurses and specialists, "continued to be in great demand," said the City official, who said the average occupancy of beds in the private system in AMBA was at 82 percent.

Speaking during an event launching home-purchasing loans in the capital, President Alberto Fernández said that Argentines needed to take care of themselves, "beyond the denial that some have" – a clear reference to his disagreement over the shuttering of schools in the Buenos Aires metropolitan area (AMBA).

 "Some deny that there is a reality that infects us and kills us," said the Peronist leader.

A total of 99,389 tests for Covid-19 were carried out Tuesday, an increase on the previous day’s total of 66,703. To date, more than 10.3 million tests have been carried out in Argentina since the start of the pandemic.

– TIMES/PERFIL
 

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