Portugal versus Usa. It is not a sporting challenge. But it is still a comparison between two countries with different vaccination rates. The first has over 90% of people covered, the United States 62%. This difference, according to American researcher Eric Topol, leads Portuguese hospitals to withstand the brunt of the pandemic, especially in times of variante Omicron, while those in the US are beginning to suffer.
Omicron and the Portugal barrier
In Portugal – according to the researcher – the cases of Covid-19 increase significantly. In fact, Portugal is reporting the highest number of infections due to the virus since March 2020, according to data from “Our World in Data”. However, the benefits of the policy adopted by the Lisbon government “emerge” from the death toll, which has clearly decreased compared to the data of the other waves.
Subsequently, the researcher also focused on the hospitalization data for patients with covid-19. In this case Topol wanted to compare the situation in the United States and Portugal. In the first country, with 62% of the total population vaccinated and 21% of the population with a booster dose, it has a very high hospitalization rate. However, if we take into account the vaccination data for Portugal, with 90% of the population with the full regimen and 34% of the citizens with the booster dose, it managed to better contain the omicron variant, both in the number of deaths and the number of hospitalizations.
Deaths and hospitalizations
Topol’s study shows that those vaccinated against covid-19 are better able to resist the omicron variant than those with lower vaccination rates. Although it is true that the number of infections is still very high, the effectiveness of vaccines in general can be seen in the number of deaths and in the number of hospitalizations.
WHO: we are beginning to see the end
Meanwhile, on Monday, the special envoy of the World Health Organization on COVID-19 said that there is an “end in sight” for the pandemic. However he warned that the next three months will be very difficult due to the spread of the Omicron variant. “We are running a marathon, we are not at the end, but we can start to see it. And before we reach the finish line there will be some bumps to overcome, “Dr. David Nabarro told Sky News.
– .
