QUITO – Beyond the hot spots of Brazil and Mexico, the coronavirus is threatening to overwhelm Latin American cities stretching from Chile to the Colombian Amazon in an alarming sign that the pandemic may be only at the start of its destructive march through the region.
More than 90% of intensive care beds were full last week in Chile's capital, Santiago, whose main cemetery dug 1,000 emergency graves to prepare for a wave of deaths.
In Lima, Peru, patients took up 80% of intensive care beds as of Friday. Peru has the world's 12th-highest number of confirmed cases, with more than 90,000. “We’re in bad shape," said Pilar Mazzetti, head of the Peruvian government’s COVID-19 task force. “This is war.” In some cities, doctors say patients