Chile closes its borders until July 14, extends pandemic state of emergency until September 30

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Chile announced the closure of borders until July 14 and will extend for 90 more days, until September 30, the constitutional state of emergency due to public calamity currently in force in the country as a restrictive framework to combat the pandemic, which has already left 1.52 million infected and 31,797 dead in the country.

The Senate and the Chamber of Deputies approved this Thursday the request made by the President, Sebastián Piñera, “given the new strains of the virus” and “the fact that the current epidemiological context is in the winter season”, as he argued in an official document.

This Thursday, June 24, the presence in Chile of the first case of the contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus was confirmed in a 43-year-old woman who arrived from the United States.

With only 3,448 infected and 51 deaths detected in the last 24 hours, the country seems to be emerging from a second wave that has put the hospital system on the ropes and forced it to confine the entire capital city once again. However, the vast majority of the suburbs were removed from the strict confinement area on Thursday.

All this is in the framework of a successful vaccination process that has already had more than 65% of the target population (comprising 15 million people) inoculated with two doses and more than 80% with one injection.

THE MEASURE DOES NOT CONVINCE EVERYONE

The President’s proposal to extend the state of emergency and thus maintain movement restrictions, quarantines, and curfews was approved in Congress. However, it did not achieve the unanimous support of the legislators of the conservative ruling bloc Chile Vamos.

Some rejected the measure because they believe greater openness is necessary, at least for those vaccinated and companies, and that the curfew should be eliminated.

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There were also opposition parliamentarians who were against what has been the second occasion in which the state of catastrophe had to be approved by Congress to be extended.

The declaration of the state of emergency due to public calamity corresponds to the President. Still, since the measure has been in force for more than a year since its first enactment, it requires the approval of Congress.

The measure was initially adopted on March 18, 2020, for a period of 90 days, just two weeks after the first Covid-19 infection was confirmed in the country.

Since then, the state of catastrophe has now been extended five times, always for the same period of time, as a framework measure under which other restrictions are applied to prevent the circulation of the virus.