In the country’s largest city, Santa Cruz, authorities have recovered 68 bodies. (File)
La Paz, Bolivia:
Bolivian police said on Tuesday they recovered more than 400 bodies from streets and homes over a five-day period, with 85% of the dead believed to have had coronavirus.
A total of 191 bodies were found in the metropolitan area of Cochabamba alone from July 15 to 20, and 141 more in La Paz, National Police Director Coronel Ivan Rojas told reporters.
In the country’s largest city, Santa Cruz, authorities have recovered 68 bodies.
The metropolitan area of Santa Cruz is the most affected by the coronavirus in Bolivia and accounts for almost half of the more than 60,000 cases in the country.
About 85 percent of the bodies were “positive cases for COVID-19 and cases with symptoms of COVID, so they will be recorded as suspected cases,” Rojas said.
The others died “from other causes, that is to say death from a disease or a violent cause,” he added.
According to the National Epidemiology Office, the western regions of Cochabamba and La Paz are experiencing a “very rapid increase” in coronavirus cases.
Andres Flores, director of the Institute of Forensic Investigations, said that between April 1 and July 19, more than 3,000 bodies recovered outside hospitals had been identified as confirmed or suspected cases of the coronavirus.
Bolivia has recorded more than 2,200 confirmed coronavirus deaths among its 11 million people.
(With the exception of the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
