The Cuban government follows the evolution of the pandemic. Photo: Estudios Revolucion,
HAVANA, Cuba.- This Monday, which marked two months of the first confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Cuba, confirmed the favorable trend of the latest dates, with 17 positive samples, 36 medical discharges in the day and no deceased: numbers that are the result of the battle of an entire country against an illness affecting four million people in the world and has killed more than 278 thousand.
At the forefront of this challenge has been the Cuban government, even before the pandemic crossed the island’s borders, and this Monday was no exception. Again, as every afternoon and through videoconference, the Palace of the Revolution hosted the meeting of the temporary working group for the prevention and control of the new coronavirus, headed by the President of the Republic, Miguel Diaz-Canel Bermudez and led by Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz.
At the meeting, Public Health Minister Jose Angel Portal Miranda reported that 4 thousand 794 people are admitted in hospitals for the care and surveillance of COVID-19, the lowest figure recorded since April 22, when the number exceeded 10 thousand.
In addition, of the 783 patients diagnosed with the disease, 475 remained in hospitals; 98.5% of them with a stable clinical evolution. To date, the Minister explained, 229 patients are recovered, representing 69% of the total confirmed ones.
Dr. Portal Miranda detailed that in the national territory there have been 44 events of local transmission of the disease, of which 23 have been closed. The two of them finished in the last hours are included: one in Santiago de Cuba municipality and the other in Baracoa.
The Minister of Public Health released that on Monday, a diagnostic system based on SUMA (Ultra-Microanalytic System) technology to detect antibodies generated by Covid-19 began to be validated on Monday. Once its results are endorsed, this research can be extended to the rest of the country.
At the same time, molecular tests of PCR in real time, in representative samples by provinces and municipalities, begins on Tuesday. This high reliability method, which will be applied to seemingly healthy people, will allow to detect the places where there has been some movement of positive cases.
At this meeting of the temporary working group, Deputy Prime Minister Alejandro Gil Fernandez reported two new measures in addition to the more than 500 the Government has implemented as part of the pandemic confrontation. The first, he explained, has to do with the possibility of consumers paying the person who brings electricity, water and gas bill to homes.
Gil Fernandez clarified this does not create an additional risk, since people stay in their homes. He added that the collection offices are still closed, and the extension of deadlines, the obligation to pay those debts and the way to pay through Transfermobile, teleBanca or directly at ATMs remain.
In addition, the decision to open bank accounts in the provinces to receive cash donations, in CUP or in CUC, from natural persons who wish to do so in the face of the situation created in the country by the pandemic. These resources, the Deputy Prime Minister said, will be used by the territorial bodies for the development of food production. Besides, the case of donations from state legal persons will be regulated.
At another time and in exchange through videoconference with the authorities of Havana, President Diaz-Canel took interested in how Mother’s Day had passed in the capital and what effect the restriction measures were having in Centro Habana municipality, the third of the most confirmed cases in the country, with 102.
In this regard, Governor Reinaldo Garcia Zapata stated that this Sunday, mobility in the city significantly decreased and attendance at the Columbus Cemetery remained well below the usual levels on Mother’s Day.
Diaz-Canel also said, the measures in Centro Habana have been received very well and locals have supported all the decisions made, in a colossal effort to stop the spread of the disease in a city with more than two million inhabitants.
Taken from the Presidency of the Republic of Cuba official web site