Amid lack of funding for public health, Honduran president tests positive for COVID-19
The Honduran president became the first government head in the Americas to publicly announce he got infected with COVID-19, when he gave the Central American country the news in a brief national broadcast Tuesday night and revealed he started feeling ill over the weekend, although his symptoms remain “mild.”
Juan Orlando Hernández, who’s on his second four-year term after a controversial 2017 election, said he received a positive test result for the respiratory illness Tuesday and would take another test shortly to determine what his next steps should be. He will work remotely and in isolation until further notice.
His wife, first lady Ana García de Hernández, tested positive too, but has not shown any symptoms, he said. Two of his aides also tested positive, and the rest of his team will be “examined.”
“Because of my job, I have not been able to stay 100 percent at home,” Hernández, 51, said. “We knew we were being exposed and faced great risk.”
As of Tuesday night, Honduras had registered nearly 10,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 330 deaths, according to its health secretary. Data from the Pan American Health Organization, which has identified community transmission in the country, indicate Honduras has the second highest number of cases in Central America, topped only by Panama, with about 21,400 cases.
Third in the list with 9,200 cases is Guatemala, whose president, Alejandro Giammattei, quickly supported Hernández on Tuesday.
“I stand in solidarity with the President of Honduras. ... I raise my prayers for your speedy recovery and express to you my consideration, respect and esteem,” he wrote.
The Honduran government started reopening its pummeled economy in June, after imposing a strict curfew in mid-March to limit the spread of the virus.
The Honduran Council of Private Business, known as COHEP for its Spanish acronym, estimated that about 1.1 million self-employed workers weren’t receiving any income, that 250,000 workers had been suspended from their jobs, and that roughly 28% of the country’s small businesses had closed because of the economic crisis.
As of June 12, the Honduran government had approved more than 4 billion lempiras, or about $175 million U.S. dollars, in funding to address the COVID-19 crisis, according to an official web page it launched by the government that outlines how the money will be used after it came under fire for lack of transparency.
However, health professionals in the country have repeatedly taken to social media to complain about the barren public hospitals in the face of the public health crisis and asked the public to donate any supplies if possible.
A member of the Honduran congress, Luis Redondo, publicly questioned Hernández’s test result and dared him to be treated at one of the nation’s largest hospitals, the School Hospital, located in the capital city of Tegucigalpa.
“If the usurper of the presidency tests positive, as they say, it is an opportunity to be seen at Hospital Escuela, where they have boasted that everything is fine and there are plenty of beds. If all is well for the people as the nationalists say, then DEMONSTRATE IT,” said Redondo, who’s a member of the Innovation and Unity Party, not Hernández’s National Party.
In his video message, Hernández touted a treatment his government has been presenting as effective to treat novel coronavirus cases, known in Spanish as “MAIZ,” an acronym that plays into the Spanish word for corn — which is widely consumed in Honduras — and that stands for a drug cocktail of microdacyn, azithromycin, ivermectin and zinc.
He said Honduran doctors were administering it to him but didn’t mention if he would visit any public health facility.
This story was originally published June 17, 2020 at 9:58 AM.
