Although the lethality rate in Cuba due to COVID-19 remains among the lowest globally, the number of elderly people who have died in recent weeks calls for reflection.

By Roberto Morejón

Although the lethality rate in Cuba due to COVID-19 remains among the lowest globally, the number of elderly people who have died in recent weeks calls for reflection.

 In the midst of a close follow-up of the health mishaps of the elderly through the family doctor, an authority on the matter warned about the deaths of people over 70 years of age, in the recent wave of contagions due to the respiratory disease.

 The alert should be interpreted as a new call to take care of the elderly from the family and the neighborhood, where the life of those who have contributed so much to society takes place.

 As pointed out by the Vice Minister of Public Health Carilda Peña, many older adults have underlying diseases, a detriment if they contract SARS-Cov-2.

 For all Cubans, the exhortation that the pandemic is not over is still valid, even though the number of cases is decreasing after the recent wave of the circulation, as in the rest of the planet, of the omicron variant.

 Although this manifestation of COVID presents less aggressive indicators, it would be a mistake to reduce or abandon hygienic-sanitary provisions, such as the use of masks and disinfection of hands and surfaces.

 In other words, the tendency in Cuba to control the disease based on vaccination reaching 88 percent of the population and with 45 percent of those immunized with booster doses, should not be interpreted as a green light to lower our guard.

 Observing the behavior of the elderly, discomfort and other symptoms and going with them to the doctor promptly, is timely advice.

 It is true that the free health system, not exempt from shortcomings and difficulties due to the impact of the U.S. blockade and the country's financial restrictions, is doing everything possible to attenuate the most recent wave of contagions.

 There is the dispatch of technical teams to a province and a municipality with a higher incidence of reports of positive cases of the virus.

 However, people can do a lot at home by preserving the veterans and preventing all, even the young, because, as experts assure, the high percentage of vaccination with native biologicals is NOT the only guarantee to avoid the antagonist virus.