The Covid-19 tragedy: Piñera’s chilling world figures in the Mañalich era

While public opinion in Chile is debated between supporters and detractors of the management of ex-Minister Mañalich, the figures are not misleading: The chilean Ministry of Health (Minsal) not only made a dreadful job, it made it much worse than Italy or Spain, examples at national level of global mismanagement in terms of political decision-making that ultimately ended in the mass death of thousands of their fellow citizens. On what do we base this statement? In the figures provided by a study carried out by Cristián Moya Gálvez, an engineer from the University of Chile and a data analyst, which we publish exclusively here, which show the extent of the disaster that not only Mañalich plunged us into, but the Piñera administration in general lines.

The study analyzes the total number of deaths and infections per million inhabitants, at the moment when the peak of daily deaths was reached for each of the countries in the analysis, where Chile is by far the worst of all in each of the indicators.

To demonstrate the epidemiological catastrophe in which we have immersed ourselves, suffice it to say that many countries such as Italy, Spain, France, Belgium and Turkey, which at some point concentrated the focus of contagions and deaths from the pandemic worldwide, reached their peak of daily deaths when they presented figures of contagion and death much lower than Chile today, where there is still no clarity as to when the daily deaths from Covid19 begin to decrease.

Looking at the daily death charts for each of the countries, we can distinguish 4 groups, the countries in which the curve has been flattened, the countries that are ready to do so, the countries that have exceeded the daily death peak, but are still halfway to flatten the curve, and Chile, which has not yet glimpsed the moment when fatalities begin to decrease.

The data was obtained from the portal www.worldometers.com

We aligned these six countries within the first group because they effectively managed to control the curve of their infected and dead, so the peak moment was averaged, as the point at which the decrease in the figures began until they were reduced to “controlled” numbers. That is, the curve in each of these countries is mature.

These countries are in a second group, because although their curve is not fully mature, according to the expected progression it is only a matter of time, now we will show you the countries of which we have called the third group.

These countries have curves that are still far from being mature, but at least it seems that they have already found their way, although it is still too early to say that, for example take the case of Iran, which as can be seen is exhibiting a regrowth of the pandemic.

Why does Chile not appear in any of these groups?

Chile does not appear in any of these groups because the moment when it will reach the peak of deaths is still uncertain. Our curve rises steadily with each passing day and despite the fact that each country has different figures, from now on we are going to use the indicator of deaths per million people to appreciate the disaster in all its magnitude.

The true legacy of Mañalich and Piñera

If we consider that Chile reached the peak of deaths on Jun 13, its total death rate per million inhabitants is scandalous, 366 deaths per million, more than double (2.4) of the deaths that France had (158) and Italy (151) at its worst, which positions Chile as the last country in the world in terms of the success of the measures applied in the pandemic, which can also be said as follows, we are, by far, the number one country in the world in failing to control the virus.

But at the time of the peak of deaths we are not only number one in the world in terms of the number of deaths per million people, we are also the first in terms of the number of infected per million people, which means that while every analyzed group had on average a total of 1,521 cases per million inhabitants at the time of their peak, Chile appears with 8,758 infected per million inhabitants, that is, we are soaring worldwide, as we have 5.8 times more cases on average than the others countries of the analysis and we still do not know when the peak of deaths will be reached.

And although we have a tremendously higher proportion of infected people, the proportion of deaths is only 2.4 times more per million inhabitants than the average of other countries (we are still world number one), which is explained by the very low case fatality rate in our country, 3.88% at June 7 (data (DEIS-WHO) of total death provided by the journalist Alejandra Matus and number of total infections from Worldometers.info).

Why is the proportion of deaths lower than that of those infected in Chile, compared to the other countries analyzed?

If Chile does not have such a low case fatality rate, which can be explained by several factors that we do not need to detail at this time, the tragedy could be of enormous proportions. This is how the study estimates the projection of deaths from covid19 once the curve is flattened, if Chile had the case fatality rate of the other countries, as shown in the last column at the end of the graph. However, the most expected is that the case fatality rate will increase in our country as the collapse of the national health system deepens.

Regarding critical patients, Chile also holds the number one ranking in the countries studied today, as it has 87 critical cases per million inhabitants on June 13, while many of the other countries display single-digit numbers. because they already have the pandemic under control and therefore have less bed occupancy in hospital facilities.

How many people will die in Chile?

In addition, the data in this table shows us that we have the highest projection in terms of the total number of deaths per million people worldwide that the pandemic will leave as it passes through the planet. In other words, we are saying that in Chile more people will die than in any other place in the world per million inhabitants. Without considering that we could be far away from reaching the flattening of the curve.

The study projects that if June 13 were the peak of deaths in Chile, the curve would flatten when it reaches a figure close to 20,000 total deaths or 1,033 deaths per million inhabitants, well above the figures of the countries most affected by the pandemic. For the calculation, the average proportion of total deaths versus total deaths at the time of the peak of deaths is used, in the countries that have already flattened the curve; Belgium, France, Italy, Germany, Turkey and Spain, which have an average of 3.0 for this ratio. So if we follow the increase in daily deaths, we are facing a historical tragedy without proportions in the country’s existence.

Who is guilty?

Although many will argue that this is not the time to look for culprits, we are dealing with a tragedy of proportions never before seen in the history of Chile, where we lead, by far, all the indicators of contagion and death of the pandemic, which cannot be explained without the government’s and health authorities management in which practically everything was done wrong. Thus, while other countries determined complete closure of the borders, Chile did so when it was too late; When other countries decided to carry out strict quarantines, Chile preferred “dynamic quarantines,” sending people to the mall or to have coffee with friends while they ‘hid’ more than half of the dead.

It is not necessary to speak about the unfortunate phrases said by Mañalich that the virus could mutate into a “good person”, that we have the best health system in the world and that the dead were being included as recovered because they could no longer infect. At this time, political parties should be in talks to see who will carry the constitutional charge against the former minister, who in addition to generating a false sense of security, was hiding more than half of the dead.

Fact that would not be more novel if we were not all aware of the scandal that generated the manipulation of the waiting lists figures, in other words, Mañalich was there not because of his technical capabilities, but because of his expertise in distorting official figures. Mañalich will have to pay for his management, which is so bad, that it is difficult to think that his plan was not carried out on purpose and this time we hope that the parliamentarians are up to their job, especially the DC bench (Partido Demócrata Cristiano -DC- Christian Democrats) , who usually vote aligned with the ruling party in almost all the constitutional accusations, the same vote that they used when promoting measures that would help Chilean families a little to alleviate the effects of this devastating pandemic, who are certainly not guilty of these figures.

If we add to this that the President of Chile, Sebastián Piñera, congratulated Mañalich after his departure from office, and that he spoke of the continuity of Mañalich’s management with the new Minister Paris, it is that he simply does not know the figures that we are presenting here or there are other underlying reasons that should be investigated with haste to see if this unprecedented tragedy can be mitigated, despite the fact that the former minister himself said at a press conference: “Whoever manages this pandemic is the president of the republic directly”. The Minsal will have many things to explain to the international community, which is currently perplexed by what happened in Chile.