Via BBC News Brasil: Covid-19: 'contagion is exponential' and only lockdown prevents major tragedy in Brazil, scientists warn. Excerpt from the Google translation:
With 2,286 deaths recorded in the last 24 hours, Brazil reached this Wednesday (10/3) a new record of deaths by covid-19 - and, according to researchers interviewed by BBC News Brasil, it will not be a surprise if the next few days are tragic new marks like this have been hit.
"In January, with the increase in the number of cases, we expected the bankruptcy of the health system and the increase of deaths this month (March). If we keep this curve, in August we can reach 500 thousand deaths in the country", summarizes the infectologist Marcos Boulos, professor at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of São Paulo (USP), referring to internal estimates by specialists and agencies advising the government of São Paulo.
According to the latest bulletin from the National Council of Health Secretaries (Conass), Brazil totals 270,656 fatal victims of covid-19 . On February 10, Brazil recorded 1,330 deaths. Compared to the data released on Wednesday, there was a 69% increase in deaths in one month. The moving average, which takes into account the figures for the immediately preceding seven days, increased 56% in the same period: from 1,041 to 1,626 deaths per day.
According to the infectologist, from today to August, the predicted death curve can only be stopped with strictly enforced social isolation - if possible with stronger enforcement by police, he suggests.
