With full stations, Paraisópolis prepares new plan against Covid

Amid the rise in Covid-19 cases and flu outbreaks earlier this year, residents of Paraisópolis, the second largest favela in São Paulo, in the south zone, began to organize to try to reduce the impact of this new phase of the pandemic. in the community.

The G10 Favelas, a group that brings together leaders from 10 communities in Brazil, opened a
collective to collect donations and pay for the hiring of an ambulance for the residents of Paraisópolis, in the south zone of the capital of São Paulo.

The idea is to resume the plan to combat the coronavirus that was launched in the community at the beginning of the pandemic.

For almost a year, between March 2020 and February 2021, the Union of Residents of Paraisópolis maintained private ambulances in the community to help anyone with symptoms of coronavirus. The service, which cost R$150,000 a month, was paid for through donations and was closed due to lack of money.

Now, with the increase in cases of flu and coronavirus in the city of São Paulo, the association wants to prevent the spread of diseases in the neighborhood. “We cannot run the risk of the situation getting worse”, says Gilson Rodrigues, national coordinator of the G10 Favelas and president of the Union of Residents.

The increase in cases has been felt in the neighborhood with the capacity of health equipment. Last Saturday (8), a resident with Covid-19 waited five hours for an ambulance from Samu (Mobile Emergency Care Service).

His wife, Tamara Araújo, 28, says that when rescuers arrived, her husband was unconscious. “He had a cardiac arrest. I thought he had died, it was horrible,” he says.

He was taken to Campo Limpo Hospital and was hospitalized until Monday (10). The couple had been diagnosed with coronavirus that same week.

Gilson says that the demand for care in health facilities in the region has increased. “We arrived in a period of 600 people [procurarem a AMA] per day”.

The Mural Agency report was in the AMA (Ambulatory Medical Assistance) Paraisópolis
on Wednesday night (12) and found a long queue for service at the place. At least 25 people with flu-like symptoms, which may or may not be Covid-19, were sitting in a tent outside the unit.

Housekeeping assistant Kelly Cristina, 52, had been waiting for a Covid test for four hours. A bank employee, she says that three other colleagues had the diagnosis for the coronavirus confirmed in the last few days. “As there was a case there, they sent me to take the test”.

She had a headache and a fever. as showed the leaf, Febraban (Brazilian Federation of Banks) confirmed an increase in Covid records among bank employees.

Also on the waiting list for the exam was Eloia de Oliveira, 33. This was the second time she had attended the unit on the same day. Earlier, he had taken his 9-year-old daughter, who tested positive for the disease.

By early Wednesday night, tests of the type, which show the result in 15 minutes, were over, according to patients. Sought this Thursday (13), the city hall did not return until the publication of this text.

With symptoms such as fever, body ache and stomachache, Eloia was waiting to undergo an RT-PCR test, whose result takes longer to be ready. Until then, she will need to maintain isolation in the house, alongside her daughter and six other family members who live in the property. “There’s no way to have isolation. Everyone ends up getting it”.

The G10 Favelas is studying opening spaces to keep people with confirmed cases of Covid isolated from the rest of the family while they go through the transmission period. “It’s practically impossible to isolate with so many people”, summarizes Gilson.

At the beginning of the pandemic, Paraisópolis also had spaces to assist in the isolation of confirmed cases. However, the so-called “reception centers” were closed and it was difficult for residents to join.

The favela became a reference in the fight against the pandemic in 2020 with actions such as the creation of the “Presidents of Street” program, which separated volunteers to monitor the situation of families every 50 houses.

The ambulance hired by the Union of Residents for this new phase of the pandemic began operating in the favela this Tuesday (11) and should work 12 hours a day, at a cost of R$ 45,000. Until this Thursday (13), the association had not yet received any donation to finance the service.