In the year 2021, Latinos left the isolation and confinement imposed last year against the pandemic to go out to get vaccinated against covid – 19. Even so, they continued to be the ethnic group in Los Angeles County with the highest number of infections and deaths.
To date, as reported by the County Health Department California, the 54. 3% of Latinos over 5 years of age have received both covid vaccines, and the 61. 5% have at minus one dose.
“This year was different from last 2020 when we were in hiding without human contact. In the 2021 we were able to go out and enjoy the family. With vaccines, people who get sick from covid are hardly going to hospitals anymore, “said Dr. Ilan Shapiro, Altamed’s Medical Director of Health Education and Welfare.
However, he said that again hospitals are saturating like last year at this time, but stressed that vaccinated people are less likely to fall into the hospital.
He recalled that there were many problems to get more Latinos to get vaccinated. “It was necessary to disseminate and share information about the vaccine. Our community has two or three jobs and it was difficult for them to go to get vaccinated. ”
County and state health authorities are They allied with community organizations to launch countless vaccination campaigns and make the vaccine accessible to Latinos.
They knocked on the doors of homes, stood outside Hispanic supermarkets, in parks, went to work sites and even paid transportation to people who did not have the means to get around to go to a center vaccination.
Many campaigns were carried out to educate the Latino population about the vaccine, and respond to all the myths that have circulated around immunization.
The doctor Shapiro considered that we are one of the populations that most want the vaccine, but access was difficult during the year that is ending.
“The lessons learned in this pandemic is that we must share and ask. And remember that if we are not vaccinated yet we must do it, and if we do not have the reinforcement, put it on. ”
He said that Latinos are extremely very important. “We have to take care of ourselves and set the example.”
He also made it clear that we should take advantage of this experience to monitor our eating habits more.
“ Much of our community suffers from diabetes and obesity. So we have to change and improve our eating habits. Pandemics are going to see many, but when a virus finds a healthy body, it can cope better ”.
Unfortunately, Latinos continued to put the highest number of positive cases of covid and deaths from this virus in the 2021.
So far in the pandemic, of 1.5 million covid cases in Los Angeles County, 743, 253 were Latino until mid-December of 2021.
And of 27, 473 deaths occurred in the county because of covid, 13, 799 have been Latinos, the ethnic group that has suffered the most deaths from the pandemic. The closest group in the number of deaths are whites with 6, 185.
Over and over again, households mourned this year. Many are the stories of pain. Between August and September, Daniel and Davy Macias’ couple died of coronavirus, leaving their five minor children orphaned. The oldest of their children was 8.
Daniel was a middle school math teacher, Davy was a delivery nurse, and at the time of contracting COVID, she was pregnant. She gave birth by cesarean section while she was intubated. Neither Daniel nor Davy were vaccinated.
Why Latinos?
Dr. David Hayes-Bautista of the Center for Study of Latino Health and Culture at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA), said that because the largest number of non-citizen Latinos in California are concentrated in the ages of 35 to 49 years, and of 50 to 64 years, and tend to be essential workers, they are more exposed to covid.
“ The coronavirus is an opportunistic predator, hitting essential workers that keep the state running by doing jobs that cannot be done from home ”, said Hayes-Bautista.
And when we already thought we were breathing a bit of the pandemic, after the riante Delta that appeared in the middle of the year; At the end of November, a new strain of covid emerged, Ómicron, which continues to spread in Los Angeles.
Until 19 December, confirmed 56 new cases of Omicron, 3, 258 new covid infections – 17, 743 hospitalized and 7 new deaths.
The Department of Health reported that the best protection continues to be the vaccine and the use of a mask.
At the end of the week of 17 in December, the covid spikes occurred in all sectors, with the exception of nursing homes. A 118% in education, 13% in shelters that serve the homeless, 24% in workplaces and churches and 83% in group meetings in homes.
“Given the increasing number of cases, the high rate of community transmission and all evidence that our immune system needs a vaccine booster over time to be able to attack the covid virus. No one eligible should delay the booster dose, ”said Dr. Barbara Ferrer, county director of public health.