Mexico’s President rejects “exaggerated authoritarian measures” in third Covid-19 wave

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, asked this Monday “not to exaggerate with authoritarian measures” in the face of the third wave of Covid-19 in the country, by assuring that this upturn is less harmful than the previous ones.

“Do not exaggerate with authoritarian measures. In our country, there was no curfew, there were no drastic measures, not even in the worst moments,” said the president during his morning press conference from Veracruz, a state in eastern Mexico.

Despite the third wave of contagions that the country is experiencing, where last week for four consecutive days there were increases of more than 15,000 new cases per day, López Obrador denied that he was thinking of new measures that would lead to the closing of activities as occurred at the beginning of the pandemic.

“We are not going to take any decision to close down; we already know how to take care of ourselves,” he said.

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He affirmed that the population already knows that Covid-19 is a disease, “a very harmful virus that causes a lot of pain and sadness.” “We have lost family friends, we all have to take care of ourselves, but we have to move forward as it is happening, without being subdued by the pandemic,” he said.

Mexico is the country with the fourth most deaths from Covid-19, with more than 238,000 confirmed deaths and almost 2.75 million cases.

But López Obrador recalled that his government recommended that the restrictive measures should not be excessive in the country’s status, as many people have to make a living on the streets. “That we give people the freedom to take care of themselves and not to be guarding them,” he said.

However, he said that the states acted with absolute freedom to impose restrictive measures, which led to some complaints from the people, and he assured that the same thing happened in other parts of the world.

“There are big demonstrations in Europe, in France, due to these excessive measures, so we should all be careful,” he requested.

He also asserted that the third wave of contagions is less intense than the two previous ones, in July 2020 and last January, and stressed that it mainly affects young people because vaccination was prioritized in older adults. “This shows that the strategy of vaccinating older adults first was appropriate,” he argued.

VACCINATION TO BE INTENSIFIED

The president assured that vaccination against Covid-19 is already being intensified.

“There is no other alternative, there is no other option to face the virus, the best is the vaccine, we must be very clear about that, if we are vaccinated we are protected,” he said.

He insisted on his goal that by October, all Mexicans over 18 years of age will be vaccinated at least with a single dose and that this month they will cover half of the adult population.

“We want to reach 50 %, let’s see if before the end of the month we are at 50 % of vaccination for those over 18 years of age,” he said.

Likewise, López Obrador said that vaccination would be accelerated for all adults in 800 municipalities of Veracruz, Puebla, Guerrero, Oaxaca, and Chiapas.