WASHINGTON, United States (CMC) — The director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) Dr Carissa Etienne Wednesday urged the G7 countries to prioritise Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) following the promise by the world’s richest countries to donate one billion vaccine doses to countries in need.

“Those countries that are suffering the most should be at the front of the line,” she told reporters at her weekly media briefing.

The Dominican-born PAHO official said that only one in 10 people in Latin America and the Caribbean have been fully vaccinated against the coronavirus (COVID-1).

“Yet we are a region of more than 600 million people where cases are mounting, hospitals are full, and variants are rapidly circulating,” she said, adding that “vaccines are urgently needed today”.

Dr Etienne, reporting on the pandemic’s deadly trajectory, said that more than 1.1 million new COVID-19 cases and 31,000 deaths were reported in the past week in the Americas, including the United States and Canada.

She said for the past few weeks, four of the five countries with the highest weekly death counts in the world have been in the Americas.

“While vaccines are needed everywhere, we hope G7 nations will prioritise doses for countries at greatest risk,” she said, referring to those in Latin America and the Caribbean that have not yet received enough vaccines to protect even the most vulnerable.

She said at the same time vaccine acceptance is high in Latin America and the Caribbean, where “people are eager for a chance to get vaccinated”.

“I want to be clear that the primary issue in the Americas is vaccine access, not vaccine acceptance. Across Latin America and the Caribbean, we have a long legacy in immunisation and trust in the life-saving power of vaccines.

“Once new doses are available, countries are ready to distribute them as quickly as they arrive and PAHO will work tirelessly to get vaccines to every corner in our region, until this pandemic is behind us,” Dr Etienne said, adding that along with vaccines, the region needs financial support for additional supplies.

“The region also needs to ramp up its own manufacture of vaccines,” she said, suggesting that as vaccines arrive in the region hey should go first to populations at high risk of developing severe COVID-19 cases, such as the elderly, frontline health workers and people with pre-existing conditions. She said health workers, in particular, should be prioritised because they are vital for response to the pandemic and “are also some of the most trusted voices for vaccines”.

“People turn to health workers — including doctors, nurses, and community health workers — for medical advice, so we must ensure that our health workers have the information they need to answer their communities’ and their own families’ questions,” Dr Etienne said,

“I want to remind citizens that the vaccines authorised by WHO (World Health Organization) and delivered through COVAX have been thoroughly assessed by experts. So, when it’s your turn to get vaccinated, embrace what’s available to you and don’t delay your vaccination,” she said, urging people to make sure to get their second doses.

Dr Etienne detailed the pandemic’s course, noting that Mexico reported a slight increase in cases due primarily to the Baja California and Yucatan regions. In the Caribbean, Cuba and the Dominican Republic are reporting most new cases, while Trinidad and Tobago is still reporting high death rates.

In Central America over the past two weeks, infections have been rising in Belize, Panama, and Guatemala while in Honduras and Costa Rica, cases are beginning to decline.

Further south, the pandemic is filling hospitals in Bolivia, Chile, and Uruguay, and most patients are younger people between 25 and 40 years old. In the Brazilian city of Sao Paulo, 80 per cent of ICU beds are filled by COVID patients. Colombia’s large metropolitan areas are also seeing very high ICU bed occupation.

“Against this backdrop, we urge countries to tighten public health measures in places with high transmission. This is the most effective way to bring cases down until we have enough vaccines for everyone,” Dr Etienne added.