After 120 days of the pandemic in Chiapas, journalists from Chiapas Paralelo and Alerta Chiapas agreed in a discussion “The Impact of COVID-19 on the Citizens of Chiapas” that the health sector in the state is saturated in the effort to contain the COVID-19 pandemic.
“People such as the SNTSA leader, the union representative from Gomez Maza Hospital and the delegate of the Red Cross in Chiapas have raised their voices to say that the system has collapsed. Citizens contradict the official figures because there are sick people in their environment, people who have sought care at COVID clinics and have not received it; the general figures generate mistrust, Facebook seems like an obituary [page]”, said Samuel Revueltas, a journalist with Alerta Chiapas.
“The figures are laughable and the truth is that people don’t believe them. There is strong under-registration, the numbers of deaths and those infected have nothing to do with reality, funeral homes alone report 5 [compared] to 1 deaths in the civil registry. The system has collapsed, everything has gone out of control and it is a scenario that was expected, but it seems that there is a desire not to tell the truth”, according to the journalist from the magazine, Isain Mandujano.
Angeles Mariscal, a journalist from Chiapas Paralelo, called on the citizens to initiate a strategy that permits knowing the real numbers of positive patients and deceased in order to be certain of how the situation is and how to deal with the pandemic. She said that for that they are going to launch surveys to have a more specific diagnosis.
On another note, the leader of Section 50 of the National Union of Workers of the Ministry of Health (SNTSSA) of Chiapas warned about the increase in attacks on health sector workers in some communities of the state, that 622 workers have been registered as infected, and 24 of its members have already died from COVID-19.
“Now the health workers have to face the risks of attacks and aggressions on the part of the relatives of the patients who are becoming ill from this pandemic” and he is concerned that the Secretary of Health, Jose Manuel Cruz Castellanos, who has “ignored” and dismissed health workers who are causing difficulties or contradicting, or legally intimidating those who protest in each of the work centers where they are employed.
For more information in Spanish:
CONVERSATORIO “El impacto del COVID-19 en la ciudadanía de Chiapas”, Youtube 21 de junio de 2020
Sistema de Salud colapsado y credibilidad por los suelos: Periodistas, Alerta Chiapas, 22 de junio de 2020
Sindicato denuncia aumento de agresiones a personal médico; confirman 24 muertes por Covid-19, Chiapasparalelo, 22 de junio de 2020
ASEGURAN periodistas en panel que Sistema de Salud en Chiapas ha colapsado,El Sol de Chiapas, 22 de junio de 2020
Sector Salud en Chiapas, al borde del colapso por el coronavirus, AFN noticias, 22 de junio de 2020
For more information in SIPAZ:
sipazen.wordpress.com 