- Despite its remote location, the Peruvian city of Iquitos on the Amazon River was one of the first parts of the country to be hard hit by COVID-19.
- He says that in those early days of the pandemic, he wasn’t too worried about this new coronavirus that was causing such a ruckus elsewhere in the world.
- As oxygen tanks drained with no way to refill them, Celis says all his staff could do was try to make patients comfortable.
- Despite having a population that’s less than half the size of the United Kingdom, Peru’s registered 50,000 more deaths than the U.K. The pandemic so far has killed more than 200,000 people in the South American nation.
Being secluded in the early days of the COVID pandemic appeared to be a benefit. It has the potential to postpone the virus’s arrival. It might make it easier to keep it under control. In the instance of Iquitos, however, this was not the case as reported by OPB.
Peru
Even though it is not an island, people in Iquitos, Peru, refer to their city as “una isla,” or “an island.”
Residents boast that it is the world’s largest city that is not accessible by road.
There are only two ways to get there: by boat or by plane.
Peru’s COVID death toll is now the highest in the world, significantly exceeding that of any of its neighbours and more than double that of the United States. COVID is said to have killed over 6,000 Peruvians out of a population of 1 million. The death rate in neighbouring Ecuador is just over 1,800 per million. The COVID death rate in the United States is around 2,400 per million.
COVID was particularly fatal in Peru because of a mix of conditions, according to Mariana Leguia, an infectious disease researcher in Lima. “It was a perfect storm,” says Leguia, who is the director of the genomics lab at the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú.
COVID overtakes the ‘island’ city
On the ground floor of his church in Iquitos, Padre Raymundo maintains a medical clinic six days a week.
“In the evenings, I work as a priest “ he continues, laughing.
However, that initial hope would rapidly fade.
And in the enormous Loreto Province, where Iquitos is the capital, there were only 12 ICU beds at the time – an astoundingly low number for an area that runs across 500 miles of rainforest, bordering Ecuador, Colombia, and the Brazilian state of Amazonas.
Some folks were even sleeping on the floor on cardboard.
Anatomy of Peru’s ‘Perfect Storm’
Part of the perfect storm that made COVID so deadly in Peru, according to Mariana Leguia, an infectious disease expert at the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Per, was the country’s reliance on imports.
Peru lacked the financial and political clout to compete in that frenetic market.
Peru’s 33 million people live in poverty, with about a quarter of the population living in poverty.
“So when the closure happened, these people were utterly jobless,” Leguia observes. During the epidemic, Peru also lacked the stable political leadership needed to deal with the domestic issue and negotiate for medical supplies from other countries.
“I believe we had four or five presidents last year. I’m losing track “According to Leguia. The right answer was four. However, she claims that the political climate made it practically impossible for the government to respond effectively to the massive medical, economic, and social disaster, whether it was four or five. “Because every three months there is a big turnover of authority,” she explains.
This was the ultimate blow
Peru’s final blow came in the form of a lack of oxygen.
“The main driver of deaths in the context of the epidemic was essentially a lack of oxygen,” adds Leguia.
The increase in deaths caused havoc. The morgue at the hospital was completely packed. The city’s crematorium, however, couldn’t keep up and had to close. Meanwhile, hospital employees were working long shifts in the sweltering heat, using only a single mask. Doctors and nurses, including Celis, began to fall ill. Sixteen members of the workforce, including six doctors from the hospital, died.
Celis claims that all his team could do was try to make patients comfortable while oxygen tanks ran out and there was no means to refill them.
He responds, “You weren’t doing anything heroic.” “You were just resisting because you needed to do your task. You felt obligated to be present, yet you were terrified for your children, wife, and family.”
A small miracle in Iquitos
The narrative of an isolation centre in Iquitos portrays the growing tragedy – and a hopeful way forward.
At the same time that Iquitos’ main hospital was overwhelmed with COVID patients, Padre Raymundo Portelli was in charge of a church-run isolation centre for mild to moderate COVID cases.
“Patients were dying because they didn’t have enough oxygen,” he explains. “I was sitting here, and I recall saying mass for them. But I had no idea what to do.”
He was dubious. Despite this, he put a fundraising plea on his Facebook page.
“And there were a million soles in my accounts in one day, one day!” Portelli was taken aback.
The cost of a million Peruvian soles is around $250,000. Padre Raymundo and the local health department had purchased the equipment for a new bottling plant in Lima, arranged for it to be flown to Iquitos, and erected it at the regional hospital in less than two weeks. The demand for oxygen was initially so high, with health personnel and civilians lining up with canisters for a sick relative, that the city had to deploy police officers at the plant to maintain order.
Padre Raymundo’s fundraiser went on, and he was able to earn enough money for four more plants for Iquitos.
A temporary 150-bed COVID unit was also created behind the regional hospital on what used to be a soccer field. It wasn’t completed until the initial wave of the epidemic had passed, which took several months and peaked in November. But, according to Dr Celis, it was a lifesaver during the second wave, which hit the Amazon region in January 2021.
A mixed forecast for the future
In April of this year, the second wave of cases in Peru peaked.
Cases and deaths have reached a relative nadir.
Officials say they’ve been expecting a third wave, but it hasn’t arrived yet.
The current issue, according to Dr Celis, is that the regional hospital is once again overburdened… but not with COVID patients.
“Medical staffing has not been enhanced,” Celis says.
He says, “They want to forget.”
Forget about the mortality wave that hit the city just weeks after many residents learned about a sickness named COVID-19 that was spreading hundreds of miles away in Asia.
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Source: OPB
