The government of Mexico City postponed the update of the COVID epidemiological traffic light for this Friday afternoon, when the federal Ministry of Health makes the announcement.
Unlike previous press conferences, this Friday’s did not begin with the announcement of the color of the traffic light that the country’s capital will maintain for the following week.
This time, Eduardo Clark García, General Director of Digital Government of the Public Innovation Agency, focused on giving data on vaccination and hospitalizations in Mexico City.
It was not until later, in the reporters’ questions section, that the head of government, Claudia Sheinbaum, responded to an express question that “until in the afternoon the federal Ministry of Health will give the color of the traffic light.”
“We know that they are reviewing the issue of Mexico City with the new methodology,” he commented.
“It is important to advance that our strategy is to vaccinate and give information to citizens to protect ourselves, that no activity will be closed regardless of the color of the traffic light”, added the head of government.
Regarding the fact that the State of Mexico announced this Friday that it will turn yellow, he said that “very likely we will be in the same condition but we do not want to advance.”
In his speech, Clark García indicated that the capital’s government has registered a daily average of about 7,800 positive cases. However, he assured that hospitalizations for COVID have been incidental, that is, of patients hospitalized for other causes who tested positive for the disease in their admission control test.
“In recent weeks, between 20 percent and 40 percent of hospital admissions of patients who tested positive for COVID-19 were not hospitalized for COVID-19,” he stressed.
Traffic light methodology adjustment
Last Friday, Sheinbaum reported that the federal Ministry of Health is working on adjusting the methodology for the COVID traffic light due to the new challenge that the omicron variant has represented.
In this regard, Clark García pointed out that two aspects must be taken into account:
- vaccination coverage, since each state has advanced in a different way. “Fortunately, our country has very high coverage and our city is the city with the highest coverage in our country,” he said.
- The triggering of COVID infections and the correlation with hospitalizations, since although these have increased, they are less than the new cases of the virus. The official assured that before they went hand in hand, along with the deaths. “Derived from what we know about the omicron variant, we have to adjust to the new evidence about those impacts,” he said.
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