In 2019, Halloween in Medellin, Colombia, seemed like a big party; however, medellin is now the epicenter of a national peak in the instances of Covid-19 and the entire metropolitan domain is experiencing curfews, a ban on the sale of alcohol and a cancellation of many occasions planned for the holiday weekend.
Last Tuesday, as part of Colombian President Ivón Duque’s normal televised showdown, Colombia’s Minister of Health Fernando Ruiz said a series of restrictions would come into effect for the long Halloween weekend in Medellin: a ban on the sale of alcohol from Friday night to the first hour of Tuesday, as well as curfew after 6:00 p. m. for young people and after 10 p. m. m. for adults. The same old occasions when young people buy groceries will also be closed.
In his speech, President Duque said the goal of these measures is to curb the spread of the virus that had inflamed more than a million Colombians as early as the last week of October.
For more than five months, as of March, most citizens of the city were allowed to buy once or twice a week and on many holiday weekends full closures were in force.
At the end of August, when the municipality was reopened, the official message of the mayor of Medellin went from “Total Care” to “Everything will be fine”, moving from an environment of constant surveillance to “Everything will be fine”.
Since then, the instances of Covid-19 have increased in that city and its more than 3. 7 million inhabitants, with the instances reported in the age group of 20 to 39 years.
According to the National Institute of Health of Colombia, the subsidiary of Antioquia, a region where Medellin is located, has recorded 3,000 deaths and more than 160,000 since March.
At the end of October, the average of 7 days of instances for Antioquia exceeded 1815, surpassing Bogotá and its capital region, Cundinamarca, which has an average of 7 days of 1802 instances.
Medellín is also where me and the paintings and, furthermore, my own Covid-19 diagnosis came, coincidentally, a few days after the restrictions were lifted.
The chain of infection was clear. My spouse had gone to dinner with his family, who had taken moderate precautions, but some of them kept running out of the house.
When one of the members of his family circle entered the hospital, this had already spread to the family circle and my home.
For members of the circle of family members with personal fitness insurance or the employer, they may get a verification result within 24 hours, while public sector members had to wait six days to get a verification result.
Even after several months of crisis, testing can be slow, inaccessible, or all three.
With our assurance, we won a telemedicine consultation, lending an oximeter and a loose thermometer, but none of that for the circle of relatives in the public option, even if the hospital is still loose for them.
Charging an oximeter can be prohibitive for those earning the minimum wage, making it much more difficult to track important symptoms.
Everyone is home now and we are recovering, however, even with my symptoms, it took me more than six weeks to return to their full capacity.
Meanwhile, cutting-edge answers to Halloween celebrations would come into play. For us, Halloween continued, but through video chat, with a quiz (with prizes!) And other people dress. In the meantime, we just have to wait for everything to work, to be really good.
I am an Australian scientific journalist in Medellin, Colombia since 2014, southern countries face the world’s biggest clinical challenges: sustainable development.