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| Published Wednesday, April 21, 2021
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Due to the increase in covid-19 infections in Costa Rica, and the risk of saturation of the Intensive Care Unit beds for critical patients, the National Chamber of Tourism, Canatur, called on the tourism sector and citizens to apply sanitary measures to avoid spread of the disease.
“The country is on the edge of saturation of the occupation of ICU beds, we cannot ignore what is happening or act irresponsibly,” said Rubén Acón, president of Canatur. “If the third wave of contagious diseases continues to increase could become uncontrollable. We cannot allow that on the resources for the care of patients who may need this medical assistance."
According to Acón, all tour operators must be responsible and guarantee compliance with the sanitary guidelines in their facilities and in all tourist activities; as well as ask their clients to comply with sanitary measures.
According to Social Security, as of Monday, public hospitals had reached 93% occupancy in ICU beds.
On Tuesday, the Ministry of Health reported the most recent status of the covid-19 public health crisis in the country:
• 1,130 new covid-19 cases are reported, bringing the total to 29,697 current active cases.
• 28,324 foreign-born people have been infected as part of the 231,967 cases reported since March 2020, approximately 12.2% of total cases. Of these, authorities confirmed the death of 32 foreign-born patients. But since October, there is no updated information about foreign-born deaths due to covid-19.
• 579 patients are being treated in public hospitals, where 269 patients are currently in ICUs and 310 patients are in recovery rooms. Many of the remaining infected patients are quarantined in their homes.
• 199,166 patients have fully recovered, an 86% recovery rate.
• 919,324 covid-19 tests have been conducted in Costa Rica, according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering of Johns Hopkins University in the U.S.
• 3,104 deaths are listed as covid-19 related, a 1.3% death rate.
Readers can see the current number of infected people in each district on the National Distance Education University on its Covid-19 Map website.
According to Johns Hopkins University, the pandemic has killed more than 3 million people worldwide.
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