Colombia’s Medellin emerges as surprise COVID-19 pioneer
BOGOTA, Colombia — Two and a half million residents. Four confirmed coronavirus deaths.
As coronavirus cases surge in Latin America, the Colombian city of Medellin is defying expectations and managing to keep numbers remarkably low.
Months into the pandemic, there are just 741 confirmed cases citywide and only 10 patients hospitalized in ICUs with COVID-19. The metropolis recently went five weeks without a single COVID-19 death.
“Medellin can be considered a best-case scenario,” said Dr. Carlos Espinal, director of Florida International University’s Global Health Consortium.
In theory, that shouldn’t be the case. The city is dense, home to many poor residents who will go hungry if they quarantine for too long and connected by a congested public transportation system. All these factors have made the virus especially hard to contain in Latin America.
How has Medellin, so far, defied the odds?
City officials and epidemiologists credit early preparation, a novel app that connected needy residents with food and cash while also collecting important data that later helped track cases, and a medical system that has moved rapidly to treat the sick before they fall critically ill.
Mayor Daniel Quintero’s critics fear the immense data being collected on citizens amounts to a severe invasion of privacy, but even they admit that it has proven effective in containing COVID-19.
“It’s impossible to fight the virus without information,” Quintero, 39, said. “We’d have deaths in the hundreds if we hadn’t made these decisions.”
Quintero, Medellin’s youngest mayor ever, is an engineer by training who began holding COVID-19 prep meetings in January, weeks after taking office. The virus was a blip on the radar for most Latin American governments back then. Some thought he was absurd for worrying about a virus raging in China.
Medellin did many of the things other cities would try in the weeks ahead, but it had some built-in advantages. Its international airport receives far fewer travelers from abroad than bigger cities like Bogota. That made tracking passengers landing from hot spots like Spain and the U.S. easier. It also has what is considered one of the best public health systems in Latin America.
Quintero said he knew that in order for many residents to quarantine, they’d need food and cash. Using his tech background, he led the city in launching Medellin Me Cuida (Medellin Takes Care of Me), an app offering aid to those who signed up and requested help.
The response has been enormous: 1.3 million families — some 3.25 million people in total — from Medellin and surrounding areas registered.
The aid was key for Maritza Alvarez, who lives with six elderly relatives, two of whom are street vendors. Since signing up, she said they’ve gotten packages of food three times and two cash transfers. That has allowed them to mostly stay indoors instead of going out to earn money and buy food.
The app also asks questions such as who users live with, if they have COVID-19 symptoms and what pre-existing health conditions they suffer. That information has proven key in identifying cases, but it has also raised concerns.
Two cases have been filed in court challenging Medellin’s assertion that downloading and registering with the app is voluntary, noting that businesses and employees are being asked to sign up in order to restart work. A judge ruled in favor of one complainant, agreeing that not all the information requested should be obligatory. Others are concerned about what the data might be used for once the pandemic is over.