Cuban President summons greater responsibility in festivities

Cuban president Miguel Díaz-Canel, called today to increase social responsibility and hygienic-sanitary measures regarding end of the year festivities in the face of the rebound in Covid-19.

The increase in cases of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus in the country is related to the behavior of people, in particular travelers from abroad, said the president at the meeting of the temporary working group for the prevention of the pandemic.

For his part, the Minister of Public Health, José Angel Portal, explained that the previous week the island reported the highest number of new infections since the beginning of the disease.

During this month, the average number of cases per day amounts to 108.6, which represents an increase compared to November of 125.3 percent, said the owner quoted by the website of the Presidency of Cuba.

In that period 1,345 imported cases were diagnosed, which represents 47.6 percent, and 1,479 autochthonous cases, most of them related to people arriving from other countries.

In addition, the daily average of imported patients in December was 51.7 and the main countries emitting the infected were the United States (719 cases), Mexico (141), Haiti (94) and Panama (89).

On this day, in addition, the Cuban president debated with researchers who participate in science and technological innovation activities in the face of the new coronavirus.

Doctors in Sciences Raúl Guinovart and Lisette Sánchez presented at the meeting some results of the Study on the epidemiological behavior of travelers in Cuba.

The investigation confirmed that the island maintains good control of Covid-19 despite the increase in cases after the opening of international airports.

Most of the travelers with Covid-19 who transmitted the disease were Cubans who visited family homes, while the transmissibility of foreigners in hotels remains low, the experts concluded.

As a result, about 60 percent of those infected are first or second-order contacts of imported cases.