The COVID-19 pandemic will reach its peak in Mexico City this week

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Deputy Health Minister Dr. Hugo López-Gatell said authorities expect the COVID-19 pandemic to reach its peak in Mexico City and the metropolitan area this week.

During a news conference, President López Obrador said the peak will take place between May 6-8 and that COVID-19 will later start to decrease.

Dr. López-Gatell said according to mathematic models, the peak will be registered between May 6-10 .

Hugo López-Gatell , Mexico’s COVID-19 czar , said the pandemic is concentrated in Mexico City and the metropolitan area; Cancún , Quintana Roo; Culiacán , Sinaloa, and Tijuana , Baja California.

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Meanwhile, the metropolitan area of Guadalajara , Jalisco, and Monterrey , Nuevo León, have been able to contain the public health crisis.

Dr. Gatell emphasized that it’s important to stay home to prevent more contagions and the collapse of the healthcare system .

President López Obrador said the locations where authorities have registered a surge in the demand of beds for COVID-19 patients are Mexico City ; Sinaloa; Villahermosa, Tabasco; Cancún, Quintana Roo, and Tijuana, Baja California.

According to projections of the Health Ministry, May 8 will be a crucial day for Mexico City for it is forecast to be the peak day of the COVID-19 pandemic .

Hugo López-Gatell has stressed that the peak would have been registered on April 2 if the mitigation measures had not been implemented.

“Without mitigation interventions, we would have had a peak in April, a very early peak. We have won time; the most recent forecast is for May 8 , and I said May 6; by updating the forecast there is an additional gain and this curve is flatter than forecast on April 29,” he said.

He added that without mitigation measures, there would currently be 38,733 COVID-19 cases . “So far, we see a total decrease of 74% of cases ; if we continue with this behavior, we will have a flatter curve.

Meanwhile, López Obrador said that the most critical stage of infections in Mexico City will take place from May 6 through May 20 and urged the population to keep following the measures.

During his morning news conference, the President said that “Last night in the Health meeting, [it was reported that] in the case of Mexico City, we’re in the peak of the outbreak; this could last until May 20 . The forecast is that from that day, the number of infections could begin to decrease ”

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