Latin America

Vaccine story so far in Chile, Latin America’s fastest rollout

Chile has been a success story in rolling out coronavirus vaccines. But why are infections still rising at an uncontrolled pace?

vaccine Santiago police patrol the streets during quarantine. Photo: Erlucho/Shutterstock
Santiago police patrol the streets during quarantine. Photo: Erlucho/Shutterstock

Chile was meant to be a part of Latin America’s very own “Super Sunday” this week. On April 11, voters will head to the polls in Peru, Ecuador, and Bolivia — Chileans, too, were scheduled to elect the members of a Constituent Assembly that will write the country’s new charter. But with coronavirus infections on a rise (new daily cases per 1 million people have doubled since February 15), the government pushed the vote back to May and placed 70 percent of its 18 million citizens under lockdown.

This wasn’t supposed to happen in Chile. The country negotiated early access to multiple coronavirus vaccines and — according to big data platform Our World In Data — only Israel and the United Kingdom have inoculated a larger share of their population than Chile. Regulators have approved four immunizers, and sources tell The Brazilian Report that two more are on the way.

Chilean authorities recently presented a study stating that the Chinese-made CoronaVac...

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