The city of Buenos Aires closed 2020 with an increase in Covid-19 cases. The last day of the year marked a figure of 2,146 infections, almost 500 more than the 1,688 registered on December 30. The authorities reported 1405 positive cases among residents and 741 among non-residents, for a total of 2,146. To these are added ten deaths, seven of them residents.
In the part of the first day of 2021, it was also detailed that the occupation of intensive therapy beds in the City is 22.8 percent and it was specified that there are a total of 103 critical beds occupied in the public health system.
Since the beginning of the outbreak, a total of 992,485 swabs were performed in the City, with a positivity rate of 30.9 percent, of which 590,393 were performed on people residing in the Federal Capital, which represents a positivity of 30 , 1 percent.
Fernán Quirós, Buenos Aires Minister of Health, said in his last contact with the press that he should wait a few days to read the curve and thus verify if it is a seasonal rebound due to the end of the year meetings or if It is about the dreaded second wave that has already occurred in Europe.
In their last meeting, President Alberto Fernández, Head of Government Horacio Rodríguez Larreta and Buenos Aires Governor Axel Kicillof agreed that there has been a relaxation on the part of the citizens, after nine months of restrictions, to which is added the feeling that the light at the end of the tunnel is already on the horizon with the vaccines, even when warning of the risk of a possible second wave.
Strictly speaking, the last weeks of the year showed concentrations in public spaces, such as the funeral of Diego Maradona, the caravan of River fans to remember the two years of the Madrid final with Boca, and the social gatherings for the end-of-season parties. year.
In fact, the sanitarista doctor Jorge Rachid suggested in the last hours that there be “night restrictions to circulate.” A member of the Kicillof advisory committee, he proposed “that the borders be closed and that the night time restriction be imposed to circulate between 22 and 6”.
In radio statements, Rachid considered that “the curfew is hard, but it is what works in Europe”, while questioning the number of people who gathered last night in squares of the metropolitan area for the end of the year celebrations.
“There is unconsciousness, fueled in some cases by irresponsible hegemonic means that have encouraged anti-quarantine and anti-vaccination in an irresponsible and criminal way on the population that has no elements to defend themselves from these issues, which have to do with lies,” he said on Radio 10.
As a corollary, the President of the Nation himself admitted last night that the possibility of using the security forces to discourage mass meetings in the open air is being considered.