In Some Nations, Coronavirus Is Only One of Many Outbreaks – The New York Times

In 2019, the disease, transmitted by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, had ravaged Latin America, which suffered its worst dengue epidemic on record with more than 3 million cases and more than 1,500 deaths.

The outbreak hit Honduras particularly hard, overwhelming a public health system that had already been weakened by budget cuts and pervasive corruption and was barely equipped to meet usual demands, much less an epidemic of record size. By the end of 2019, Honduras had suffered about 61 percent of the dengue deaths in Central America.

The highest number of dengue cases occurred in the department of Corts, where efforts to control its transmission were further hampered by a lack of trained personnel and by the regions ubiquitous criminal gangs, which for months blocked government health care workers from gaining access to some of the hardest-hit neighborhoods.

Dengue remains a major concern in Latin America and the Caribbean this year. According to the latest statistics from the Pan American Health Organization, about 1,426,000 cases have been recorded in the region so far, fewer than during the same period last year. But regional health officials fear this may be an undercount caused by the focus on the coronavirus and the disease it causes, Covid-19.

Covid has been able to sometimes deviate attention from other pressing problems, said Dr. Marcos Espinal, director of the department of communicable diseases at the Pan American Health Organization, based in Washington, D.C.

On Tuesday, Dr. Carissa F. Etienne, the director of the Pan American Health Organization, said the Americas, with more than 2.4 million Covid-19 cases and more than 143,000 deaths, had become the epicenter of the pandemic.

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In Some Nations, Coronavirus Is Only One of Many Outbreaks - The New York Times