Brazil Exceeds One Million Covid-19 Cases, per Media Consortium (June 19th)

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – On Friday afternoon, June 19th, Brazil reached the mark of 1,009,699 confirmed Covid-19 cases, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, according to a survey by a media outlet consortium.

Since 8 PM on Thursday, Brazil recorded 26,017 confirmed Covid-19 cases. To date, 48,422 people have died from the disease in the country. There were 553 deaths in the last 14 hours.

The data are released by the State Health Secretariats, on which the consortium relies to produce the report. The media consortium includes mainstream news outlets UOL, O Estado de S. Paulo, Folha de S. Paulo, O Globo, G1, and Extra.

The figure was obtained with the disclosure of data from São Paulo yesterday afternoon. The state reached 211,658 confirmed cases of Covid-19 and 12,232 deaths.

According to data released yesterday morning, Ceará is the state with the second-most cases: in all, 89,485 confirmed, and 5,402 deaths.

Rio de Janeiro, which failed to release its data before this report was published, is the state with the third-most confirmed cases (87,317). In the state, at least 8,412 people have died from Covid-19.

Stabilization

On Thursday, the Ministry of Health pointed out that Brazil is “on the way to stabilizing” cases and deaths caused by the coronavirus.

In a press conference in the Planalto, Arnaldo Correia, the ministry’s Surveillance Secretary, presented figures from recent epidemiological weeks that show the country close to the plateau on the epidemic curve.

However, the secretary stated that at least two weeks are required to confirm this trend.

This comment runs counter to the W.H.O. (World Health Organization) assessment. Over 150,000 new cases of the novel coronavirus were reported yesterday to the W.H.O.

According to the organization, it was the highest number of cases in a single day, which prompted another appeal by its Director-General Tedros Adhanom, who mentioned the South American region – Brazil is the leader in the number of cases and deaths on the continent and ranks second in the world.

“The pandemic is accelerating. Over 150,000 cases were reported yesterday to the W.H.O., the highest number in a single day. Almost half of these cases were reported in the Americas, and another large part in South Asia and the Middle East,” Tedros said during the press conference.

According to him, “countries are eager to reopen their economies, but the virus is spreading and it is still deadly”.

Source: UOL