COVID-19 in Latin America: A High Toll on Lives and Livelihoods

Abstract

Latin America was hit hard by Covid-19, both in terms of lives and livelihoods. Early lockdowns in the second quarter of 2020 prevented an explosion of deaths at the time but did not stop the pandemic from later wreaking havoc in the region. This paper investigates the dynamics of pandemics in Latin America and how it differed from elsewhere. We probe the role of non-pharmaceutical interventions; the effectiveness (or lack of thereof) of lock-downs in Latin America; which structural factors contributed to the high death toll in Latin America; and the extent to which the epidemic harmed the economy. Finally, we briefly analyze the roots of the second-waves that started in the fourth quarter of 2020.

Efectos en la economía boliviana de la pandemia del COVID-19

“…Las tasas de crecimiento diario de los decesos durante la primera ola, después de subir en las primeras semanas, fueron reduciéndose sistemáticamente. 6 Esto es consistente con lo observado en muchos países. Atkenson et al (2021) subrayan la rápida caída de esas tasas.…”

Regional Economic Outlook, October 2021, Western Hemisphere: A Long and Winding Road to Recovery

“…Nonetheless, many LAC countries are still significantly below the 40 percent benchmark suggested by the IMF staff for December 2021 to end the pandemic (Agarwal and Gopinath 1 Delta is dominant in Mexico so far but has been detected in a broad set of countries in South America and the Caribbean. 2 LAC is a region characterized by inherent vulnerabilities (Bakker and Goncalves 2021). These include: (1) institutional factors such as low government effectiveness and weak healthcare systems; (2) structural factors such as a high degree of informality, which reduced the effectiveness of lockdowns (David and Pienknagura 2020); and (3) certain medical conditions such as a high proportion of the population that is overweight.…”

Occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 reinfections at regular intervals in Ecuador

“…Latin America was one of the most affected regions during the COVID-19 pandemic, mainly driven by a deficient public health system coupled with socioeconomic problems in its population (Bakker, 2021). The first confirmed case of SARS-CoV-2 reinfection in this region was reported in July 2020 in Ecuador (Prado-Vivar et al, 2021) followed by other reports in different countries (Dıáz et al, 2021;Fonseca et al, 2021;Ramıŕez et al, 2021).…”