Good morning! Today, Omicron fears rise in Brazil, not least because the country is unable to access key data on hospitalizations. Lula leads all polls for the presidential election, but which side of him would take office next year? Often overlooked, the Cerrado tropical savanna is in critical condition.
Data inconsistencies put Brazil on Omicron alert
The Omicron variant of the coronavirus has led the world to break new records of daily new confirmed Covid cases, with 2.59 million yesterday alone. But Brazil has not been able to fully assess the scope of the new wave due to data inconsistencies that date back to December 10, when hackers invaded and disrupted Health Ministry servers.
What is happening? According to Roberto Kraenkel, a physicist at the State University of São Paulo (Unesp) working with mathematical models applied to epidemiological studies, data on Covid-related hospitalizations has not been available since Health Ministry servers were taken down.
- More than the number of confirmed cases or deaths, total hospital admissions is “the single most important piece of data to assess the spread of the virus,” he said.
- The state of São Paulo has a dataset of its own, independent from the Health...