Coronavirus: Mexico's Virgin of Guadalupe and Government

For awhile, it looked like Mexico would surge past the United States when it came to deaths per million. But then the United States started to see 3,000 deaths on certain days and has pulled far ahead of Mexico on an official basis. That doesn't mean that Mexico has succeeded in suppressing the spread of COVID-19. Here is some of the recent news out of Mexico.

Per the Los Angeles Times (Dec 12), Mexico was forced to cancel the Catholic pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Per the article, it is one of the world's largest religious pilgrimages.

For weeks, church and civic authorities have been urging people to stay away from the storied shrine — erected alongside the hillside where, according to Catholic teaching, Mary, the Mother of Jesus, appeared to a peasant, Juan Diego, in 1531, just a decade after the Spanish conquest. The apparition and the central artifact of veneration — an image of the Virgin that is said to have been imprinted on Juan Diego’s cloak, which is now preserved and on view at the shrine via a moveable walkway — helped solidify Catholicism among Mexico’s indigenous masses.

The New York Times (Dec 21) reported that the federal government wasn't honest about the spread of the virus in Mexico City:

In early December, the pandemic was roaring back in Mexico City . . . Despite the surge, federal officials reassured the public during a Dec. 4 briefing that Mexico City had not reached the critical level of contagion that, according to the government’s own standards, would require a full lockdown in the city, shutting down its economy.

I find the following quote interesting as it is my understanding that the Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, is considered a liberal and might be more open to having the government assist the economy. Of course, he has opposed lockdowns so perhaps he doesn't believe a stimulus program is required. 

 . . . Unlike many global leaders, the Mexican president has not used a stimulus program to support businesses and the unemployed during the pandemic. Without a safety net in place, closing down Mexico City in the middle of the holiday shopping season would inflict considerable pain on the nation’s economy.

The following might be a little unfair as I wrote back in November that Mexico City did have some restrictions in place. Of course, the New York Times is implying that there should be full lockdowns in Mexico City. The article doesn't really go into what full lockdowns would imply. 

 . . . The mayor, for her part, could have broken with the federal government and put the city on lockdown earlier. But that move would have been politically risky. She has close ties to the Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, and he has minimized the pandemic from the start.

Back to COVID-19 deaths in Mexico. Reuters via Yahoo News (Dec 26) reports:

The populous capital's "excess mortality" from Dec. 1 to 12 - deaths above the typical number from prior years - averaged 214 a day, a government report said on Saturday. That compared to 141 excess deaths a day in November.

The rate peaked in May when Mexico City, with a population of some 9 million, recorded 320 excess deaths per day.

Mexico reported around 614 daily COVID-19 deaths during that period of Dec 1st thru Dec 12th. If you assume the 214 excess deaths during that period were COVID-19 related, the average daily deaths coming out of Mexico should really be 828. On top of that, you'd have to assume that there are excess deaths throughout the country. 

Anyways, if you add the 214 excess daily deaths during the first half of December and the 141 excess daily deaths for all of November, that would add around 6,798 COVID-19 deaths. Per Worldometer, at the end of October, Mexico had 704 deaths per million while the United States had 712 per million. By December 12th, Mexico's official figure was 872 while the United States was at 919 so the United States was pulling away from Mexico. 

However, if you add in those 6,798 additional deaths, which once again is just data from Mexico City, Mexico would soar to 925 -- above the United States' 919.