World

Mexico marks grim coronavirus milestone, passes 100,000 deaths

Mexico marks grim coronavirus milestone, passes 100,000 deaths

By Reuters

FILE - A police officer wears a protective face mask on the street after the governor of the northern Mexican state of Coahuila said on Saturday that a new case of coronavirus had been confirmed, in Mexico City, Mexico February 29, 2020. Photo: Reuters

MEXICO CITY: Mexico, the most populous country in the Spanish-speaking world, has now registered 100,000 confirmed coronavirus deaths, a few days after passing one million infections, official data showed on Thursday. Mexico's official death toll from COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the virus, is among the highest worldwide, and in the Americas lags only the United States and Brazil. With a population of about 125 million, Mexico accounts for over 7% of confirmed deaths globally, according to a Reuters analysis. Its mortality rate of nearly 10% is higher than any other country that has reported more than a million cases. Mexico's outbreak has likely been exacerbated by chronically underfunded public hospitals as well as a large informal economy in which millions have to leave home each day to earn a living. Government officials acknowledge that the count almost certainly reflects only a fraction of the real death toll. From the start of the pandemic, the government has eschewed taking on debt to fund bailouts for businesses or cash payments for workers - a different approach from many other nations that sought to cushion the economic blow. The health ministry's death toll hit 100,104 on Thursday, up 576 from the previous day. Nearly two-thirds of reported deaths so far are men, official data show. The ministry's own figures list more than 15,000 additional 'suspected' deaths. The average age of the COVID-19 fatalities is 64. Mexico City and its densely-packed suburbs - home to more than 20 million people - have contributed the most cases. 'In Mexico, the curve has never been flat,' Lia Limon Garcia, a former opposition congresswoman, wrote in a column in daily newspaper El Universal, criticizing what she described as a false 'triumphalist tone' of top officials. 'And today no quick reduction in cases can be seen.'