SAO PAULO (AP) – Dozens of COVID-19 patients in the largest city in the Amazon rainforest will be flown out of state as local health system collapses, authorities announced Thursday that the dwindling supply of oxygen tanks means some people breathlessly begins to go home.
Doctors in Manaus, a city of 2 million people, chose which patients to treat, and at least one of the cemeteries in the city asked mourners to go in their ropes and bury their dead. Patients in overloaded hospitals waited desperately all day when oxygen cylinders arrived to save some but came too late for others.
The tribes have asked the Amazon government to say it would transport 235 patients who are dependent on oxygen but who are not in intensive care units to five other states and the federal capital, Brasilia.
“I want to thank the governors who give us their hand in a human gesture,” Amazonian government Wilson Lima told a news conference on Thursday.
“The whole world looks at us when there is a problem like the lungs of the earth,” he said, referring to a general description of the Amazon. “Now we’re asking for help. Our people need this oxygen. ”
Many other governors and mayors elsewhere in the country later rendered assistance amid a flood of social media videos in which upset relatives of COVID-19 patients in Manaus asked the followers to buy oxygen for them.
Brazilian Vice President Hamilton Mourão said on Twitter that the country’s air force had taken more than eight tons of hospital items, including oxygen cylinders, beds and tents, to Manaus.
However, federal prosecutors in the city have asked a local judge to put pressure on President Jair Bolsonaro’s government to increase his support. Prosecutors later in the day said the most important air force plane in the region to transport oxygen “needed to be repaired, which brought the emergency supply to a halt.”
Neither Air Force nor the Federal Ministry of Health responded to a request for comment from The Associated Press.
The US Embassy in Brasilia has confirmed that the local authority has received a request to support the initiative, without giving details.
Manaus authorities recently called on the federal government to step up its shrinking supply of oxygen needed to make COVID-19 patients breathe. According to official data, the 14-day death toll in the city is closer to the peak of the first wave of coronavirus pandemics.
In the first peak, Manaus consumed a maximum of 30,000 cubic meters of oxygen per day and, according to White Martins, the multinational company that supplies oxygen to oxygen, more than doubled to almost 70,000 cubic meters. Manaus’ public hospitals. At his news conference, Governor blamed White Martins for the shortage of supply.
“Due to the strong impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, oxygen consumption has increased exponentially over the past few days compared to a volume that was already extremely high,” White Martins said in an email to AP. “Demand is much higher than anything predictable and … continues to grow significantly.”
The company added that Manaus’ remote location offers challenging logistics, requiring additional supplies to be transported by boat and plane. It also said it was considering bringing supplies from neighboring Venezuela to alleviate the problems in Manaus.
The governor also set more health restrictions, including suspending public transport and setting a curfew between 7pm and 6am.
The new measures challenged protesters who carried Brazilian flags through the streets on Thursday morning. Lima, who was once seen as an ally of Bolsonaro, has drawn criticism from supporters of the Conservative president for imposing new restrictions to stem the virus’ recent rise.
Bolsonaro underestimated the risks of the disease, saying that the economic downturn of the pandemic would kill more than the virus. His son Eduardo, a lawmaker who heads the Committee on International Relations in the Brazilian House of Commons, was one of many conservatives who urged their supporters in December to challenge social distance and disobey the home order.
Park of the Tribes, a community of more than 2,500 indigenous people on the outskirts of Manaus, lasted more than two months without any resident showing COVID-19 symptoms. In the past week, 29 people have tested positive, said Vanda Ortega, a volunteer nurse in the community. Two went to urgent care units, but no one needed hospitalization yet.
“We are really very worried,” said Ortega, who belongs to the Witoto ethnicity. ‘It’s chaos here in Manaus. There is no oxygen for anyone. ”
The increase in business follows two months of regular gatherings, first during local elections in November with large gatherings and long queues of voters, followed by festivities at the end of the year.
The city of Manaus declared a state of emergency on 5 January. The decision enables the municipality to temporarily contract staff, services and materials without public tenders. A separate decision suspends the authorization for opportunities and withdraws the already allocated, while a third count sets for non-significant municipal employees until March.
An article published this week indicates that a new strain of the coronavirus has been spreading in Manaus since December. The newspaper said it was concerned about greater transmissibility or re-infection potential, although such possibilities remain unproven.
According to Pedro Hallal, an epidemiologist who coordinates the Federal University, a positive COVID-19 test is not known what variant of the virus the patient has, but it is likely that the new strain was partly responsible for the management of Manaus ‘s second wave. of Pelotas’ test program, by far the most comprehensive Brazil.
“If it had been in circulation in mid-December, it would probably have circulated a lot more,” Hallal said by telephone. ‘So I think at least part of the new infections are due to the new strain. We do not have the definitive data on that, but it is very likely. ”
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Associated Press writer Mauricio Savarese reported this story in Sao Paulo and AP writer David Biller reported from Rio de Janeiro.