Mexico Asks People to Stay Home as COVID-19 Cases Climb to 251

Workers wearing a protective suits sprays disinfectant during a campaign to sanitize publi
File Photo: ULISES RUIZ/AFP via Getty Images
Ildefonso Ortiz and Brandon Darby

Mexican health officials asked people to stay at home and find ways to work remotely as the country’s cases of the Chinese coronavirus (COVID-19) reach 251. The government reported a jump of 48 new cases in one day but no new fatalities.

Mexico’s Undersecretary of Health Hugo Lopez Gatell and his staff released the new figures Saturday night during a streamed news conference. In that conference, health officials revealed they had 697 suspicious cases and had ruled out 1,463 cases.

During the streamed conference, Mexican health officials revealed that the confirmed patients have had more than 700 contacts or interactions with other people before going into isolation. Of those cases, 83 individuals who did not travel have presented with symptoms but only 43 tested positive to the virus. While those 43 cases were transmitted, officials in Mexico are choosing to not call them community transmission and is instead classifying them under the imported transmission category.

It remains unclear if the figure of 251 confirmed cases included four new cases that Michoacán’s Governor Silvano Conejo Aureoles confirmed just hours prior to the conference. According to the governor the cases were all from individuals who had traveled out of the country and became exposed to the disease. They remain in isolation. During a conference in Morelia, Aureoles Conejo called for residents to stay indoors and avoid physical contact.

Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart Texas. He co-founded Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and senior Breitbart management. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook. He can be contacted at Iortiz@breitbart.com. 

Brandon Darby is the managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Texas. He co-founded Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and senior Breitbart management. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He can be contacted at bdarby@breitbart.com.     

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