(Rico’s Digest) OPINION – To all who believe, are convinced the coronavirus pandemic is a lie, a complot to new world order, an invent of the Costa Rican government to control, I ask: where would Costa Rica be right now, today, without the intervention and measures imposed by the Health authorities?
What would you say to the families who lost a loved one or are currently on pins and needles, worrying, hoping, praying, that their loved one comes out of the hospital soon and not in a body bag?
What will you feel, if, and I don’t wish it on anyone, you get infected and now depend on the same people who you called liars, complots, controllers, to help you get better and even save your life?
By the beginning of June, three months into the pandemic we had relatively few cases of the COVID-19, very few cases of hospitalizations, and even fewer of deaths due to the coronavirus.
The number of reported new cases daily was in the teens, we got alarmed when on a given day the number passed 20. On June 6, Costa Rica reported 1,263 accumulated cases and 10 deaths by COVID-19.
With the relaxing of the measures, the numbers began to shoot up. Within a few of weeks the numbers of new cases daily doubled, hospitalizations began to increase, so did the deaths.
On June 26, one day before phase 3 of the re-opening of many economic activities took place, the accumulated cases had risen to 2,836 and the number of decease by COVID-19 to 12.
A day later, many mistook economic reopening with the end of the pandemic. Many businesses and activities that had been closed for what seemed forever were now open. People flocked to the malls, parties of large groups had to be intervened by police, for some we were back to normal.
By July 4, one week later, the number of cases daily was no longer in the teens or the dozens, but in the hundreds. In 8 days, the accumulated cases went from 2,979 on June 27 to 4,621 on July 4 and 7 deaths that week alone, for a total of 19.
On Monday, nine days later, the accumulated cases is 8,036. The number of deaths reached 34, four on Monday alone, the day with the most deaths in a 24-hour period so far.
On Monday, the number of hospitalizations rose to 159, of which 28 – 2 less than the noon report by the Ministry of Health because of the 2 deaths – stretching the limits of health services near collapse.
As you can see, during the three months under strict measures we, Costa Rica, was a model to the world. In three weeks … I ask again, where would be today without the measures? If this pandemic is not real, why are there so many families suffering?
If you really believe that it is all lie, the coronavirus is not deadlier than the flu or cancer or many of the other diseases that kill people every day, that governments shouldn’t intervene, limit our freedom of movement, impose that we wear a mask, keep social distance, behave responsibly, I say to you, look to Costa Rica’s northern neighbor.
There you will find a government that doesn’t care if you wear a mask or not, invites you to massive events, is aligned with the belief that there is no pandemic, that the virus is nothing more than another respiratory disease.
In that country, where few people have died from COVID-19, only from pneumonia, the official number of deaths is 91 and 2,891 accumulated cases. But those numbers are from a couple of weeks ago. Unofficially, local doctors and experts put the real number to 10 times or more of the official.
To the south, there is Panama. A country small in population than Costa Rica, almost a million less, it now has 47,173 accumulated cases and 932 deaths by COVID-19. Fortunately for us here, that border is closed on both sides. In fact, early in the pandemic, Panama was the source of an infection that was brought back to Costa Rica, resulting in the spread of the virus.
Whatever your opinion is, on which side of the pandemic question you are on, please wear a mask, keep your distance, stay at home. If not for you, for me and the rest of us.
