The Ministry of Health reported, this Sunday, March 20, 2022, 542 new cases of covid-19 in Colombia. In the last 24 hours, 21,368 tests were processed, of which 8,394 are PCR and 12,974 are antigens.
The report also notes that 18 Colombians died of the disease on the last day. In this way, the country reaches a total of 139,452 deaths due to the virus since the start of the pandemic.
By aggregating all the figures, Colombia reached a total of 6,081,131 infections, of which 5,669 are active cases and 5,913,303 correspond to positive cases that have already managed to overcome the disease.
As for the regions with the most reported cases, Bogotá leads with 224 infected, followed by Cundinamarca with 67 infections and in third place Valle del Cauca with 57.
There are 299 conglomerates in the country. The territories are: Antioquia, Atlántico, Barranquilla, Bogota, Boyaca, Caldas, Caqueta, Casanare, Cesar, Choco, Cundinamarca, Guainía Guaviare, Huila, La Guajira, Magdalena, Meta, Nariño, Putumayo, Quindio, Risaralda, Sucre, Valle del Cauca, Vaupés.
This is how vaccination is going in the country
The most recent report from the Ministry of Health also indicates that as of 11:59 on Friday, March 18, 2022, a total of 79,665,183 doses of the vaccine against covid-19 had already been applied in Colombia.
According to the same report, the number of Colombians with the complete vaccination schedule, that is, those who have already received the two doses of the biological, currently amounts to 28,115,233 people, while 6,290,927 people have been immunized with single doses. Likewise, 9,824,856 booster doses have been applied.
Similarly, during the last day, a total of 107,849 vaccines were applied, of which 34,357 were for the second injection, while another 6,123 were single-dose.
In the last few hours, changes in the guidelines in the vaccination plan against covid-19 were known, in which a fourth dose would be included. The announcement was made by Gerso Bermont, director of promotion and prevention of the Ministry of Health during the Unified Command Post.
Thus, as of today, it is authorized, by Resolution 419 of 2022, the application of second boosters for patients suffering from autoimmune diseases, who have undergone transplants or are undergoing immunosuppressive treatments.
The application of second boosters is being authorized “for all diseases such as leukemia, myeloma, lymphomas, people on chemotherapy, with autoimmune diseases, all those who receive immunosuppressive treatment and primary immunodeficiencies,” Bermont explained.
He also specified that this fourth dose will be applied if the attending physician considers it appropriate under his medical criteria, adding that the Ministry “should not put up barriers to access”.
And he specified that “the application of a second booster for population with particular clinical conditions under medical recommendation, will be done 30 days after the application of their third dose”
Another modification to the guidelines of the vaccination plan announced by Bermont was that it also endorsed the use of heterologous vaccination to complete schedules, that is, vaccines other than those applied in the first doses may be used for second doses and boosters.
“Just as we have been talking about heterologous for reinforcements, heterologous vaccination is allowed, to complete schemes,” he said.
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