Secretaries ask Queiroga to recognize Covid wave and encourage testing

Conass (National Council of Health Secretaries) asked this Wednesday (12) that the Minister of Health, Marcelo Queiroga, recognize a new wave of Covid-19 and support measures such as the expansion of testing and vaccination coverage.

The entity states that “the growth of cases, driven by the new variant [ômicron], once again imposes challenges on the country’s public and private health systems”.

The council also points out that Brazil “is vulnerable to a large wave of cases”, as 1 third of the population does not have a complete primary vaccination schedule.

“If the hospital system collapses, both in the private network and in the public network, preventable deaths could occur due to the non-guarantee of access to hospitalization”, says a letter signed by the president of Conass and Secretary of Health of Maranhão, Carlos Lula, and directed to Queiroga.

In the document, Conass asks for the distribution of resources to open mass testing points. The council’s proposal is a BRL 4 contribution per test sent by the federal government to each state or municipality.

It also demands “immediate outbreak of campaign for the complete immunization of the entire Brazilian family, with emphasis on childhood vaccination”.

The issue is sensitive in the federal government, as President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) distorts data and discourages the vaccination of young people.

Despite the president’s resistance, the government is expected to distribute 20 million doses of Pfizer targeted to the 5-11 age group in the first quarter. It is also awaiting approval from Anvisa to apply Coronavac to the public aged between 3 and 17 years.

Conass also asks for a position from the Ministry of Health on the national cancellation of events such as the street Carnival.

“As the most transmissible omicron and responsible for the increase in patients with mild symptoms, outpatient services will be pressured by clinical conditions that require immediate testing, medical prescription and issuance of certificates for the proper isolation of positives”, said Conass, in the note.

“In countries where the new variant already has an impact on records of mild cases, the hospital network is also under pressure from severe cases, especially in unvaccinated patients, including children,” the entity said.

In an event held by the Ministry of Health on the onus this Wednesday, Queiroga said that the variant brings fear of collapse in health care, but that the disease has not yet put pressure on these services.

The surge in Covid cases, however, has forced local governments to reopen beds. In the state of São Paulo, hospitalizations for Covid-19 in the ICU grew by 91% in eight days.

Still in the letter sent to Queiroga, Conass asks for reinforcement in monitoring the stock of medicines, protective equipment and intubation kits, input that was lacking in previous Covid-19 highs.

The council also asks for authorization to expand the Covid-19 care structure, with funding for new beds, in addition to the “immediate inclusion of the vaccination of children and adolescents against Covid-19 in the national vaccination calendar”.

The last few days in Brazil have been marked by high demand for testing and by several records of people infected by the variant – even vaccinated or who had Covid previously. The death curve, however, has not followed this rise.

Scientific entities demanded on Tuesday (11) a broader testing policy from the federal government and the permission of self-test. Demand for tests soared with the advance of contamination at the turn of the year.

In a note released this Wednesday, Abramed (Brazilian Association of Diagnostic Medicine) warned of the risk of lack of necessary inputs in Covid-19 exams. The entity recommended prioritization of exams to patients “according to a severity scale”.

Earlier, President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) again played down the health crisis and suggested that the new strain is “welcome”.

“[A] ômicron, which has already spread all over the world, as the people who really understand say: that it has a very large capacity to spread, but very small lethality”, said Bolsonaro, in an interview with the website Gazeta Brasil.

“They even say it would be a vaccine virus. They should even… According to some studious and serious people – and not linked to pharmaceuticals – they say that the ômicron is welcome and can indeed signal the end of the pandemic”, Bolsonaro also declared.

The executive director of the WHO (World Health Organization) health emergencies program, Michael Ryan, reacted to Bolsonaro’s speech, saying that “this is not the time to declare that this virus is welcome, no virus that kills people are welcome”.