At least 6.4% of Panama population infected with covid-19

In the 10 months that go into a pandemic, Covid-19 reached 6.4% of the total population of the country, that is, 269,091 people.

However, epidemiologists and members of the Health Advisory Council agree that the number of infected may be higher and range between 600,000 and 800,000 since the first case was reported, on March 9, 2020.

Francisco Sánchez Cárdenas, a member of the Advisory Council, explained that in order to determine the real figure, the Ministry of Health must carry out a seroprevalence study, but what they are observing is that for each positive case, five contacts are identified and, of those, two or three come out positive.

Of the total of cases reported so far, 27% occurred in the first half of the pandemic (March-August) and the remaining 73% in the second half (September-January).

A second wave bigger than expected

The country is about to reach a 10-month pandemic with about 270000 cases and an uncontrolled community infection, in which each passing week exceeds the previous one in the number of Covid-19 infections.

This second wave of cases does not cease to surprise epidemiologists and members of the Health Advisory Council, who expected a rebound in infections in late 2020 and early 2021, but not of the current magnitude, in which there are up to 5,000 cases in one day.