Sawt Falasteen - In Lima, infirm get Covid jabs at home as Peru's cases surge

In the poor district of Huaycan, two doctors and two nurses decked out in protective gear drive a health ministry van around, visiting people who had asked to receive the protective jab at home.

With 2.7 million infections among its population of 33 million, according to an AFP tally of official data, Peru has reported 618 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants -- by far the highest rate in the world.

"I feel relieved to have received the vaccine," said Salomina Laura, 50, who has been confined to her home in Huaycan, a community with some 680,000 inhabitants in Lima's east, with a serious hip injury.

"I could not leave the house as I am in bed with a fracture. I feel more protected, I did not have any type of vaccine" until the mobile team arrived Tuesday on the first night of the door-to-door campaign in Huaycan.

- 'Protect yourselves, brothers' -

Laura lost a brother in the first pandemic wave to hit Peru in 2020.

Jose Luis Santos, 51, lost a brother-in-law. His son, 19-year-old Jean Paul, cannot walk as the result of a stroke and had not received a single vaccine dose -- until now.

"I am happy that my son is vaccinated," Santos told AFP.

Vaccination is not compulsory in Peru, but since December 15, non-jabbed people cannot access shops or other indoor public places.

Almost 80 percent of the population aged 12 and older -- some 22 million in total -- have received two vaccine doses, and nearly six million an additional booster shot.

From next week, the government will expand the inoculation program to include children from the age of five.

"Protect yourselves with the vaccine, it is not bad," said Cristina Esqueche, 74, after receiving her booster shot at home. She is bedridden from a stroke.

"Protect yourselves, brothers of Huaycan!" she pleaded from her bed. "Get vaccinated, don't be afraid."

- 400,000 cases since December -

Nurse Cindy Villanueva said the campaign -- which will also cover other Lima neighborhoods -- was necessary after a surge in cases due to much socializing over the December holidays, "and because people dropped their guard."

"We go to the homes of patients to protect them," she told AFP.

Luis Alberto Flores's mother, another stroke patient, received a jab from the comfort of her bed.

"My mother is bedridden, I can't move her; we need two people to pick her up and carry her," Flores told AFP.

"Thank God and thank Minsa (the health ministry), which is doing its best to come to the house and give us the chance to get vaccinated."

Peru has registered about 400,000 cases, 15 percent of its total tally, since the Omicron variant was detected in the country in December.

H.Darwish--SF-PST