Put things in perspective
EcuadorCoronavirus in Ecuador: the Guayaquil drama, which has more deaths from covid-19 than entire countries and fights against the clock to give them a decent burial
Residents in Guayaquil, Ecuador's most populous city, are sharing videos of bodies dumped in the streets.
Forensic services are struggling to pick up bodies of those who have died in recent days - not just from coronavirus but from other causes as well.
Image, Guayaquil compared to entire countries
The country has confirmed 2,700 infections and 93 deaths — 60 of them in Guayaquil and its immediate surroundings. But municipal officials there said they have recovered at least 400 bodies in recent days.
Mayor Cynthia Viteri, who announced that she has tested positive for the virus, said the national government should be responsible for collecting the corpses.
“They’re leaving them in the villages, they fall in front of hospitals,” she said in a Twitter video message to residents last week. “No one wants to recover them.”
The national nurses association said up to 370 nurses across the country are believed to have been infected and that five have died.
The country’s first known coronavirus case — confirmed on Feb. 29 — was a 70-year-old woman who had arrived two weeks earlier from Italy and resided outside of Guayaquil.
Remember "El Savador"? Where you saw huge crowds as they waited for the $300 handout from the government because they had nothing left to eat?
This is their president on twitter,
"After seeing what is going on in Ecuador, we were too conservative. We miscalculated what this virus can do."
