‘Brazil is suffocating’: COVID surge creates severe oxygen crisis

Several states report critical stock levels, loans of cylinders and even transfer of patients who require oxygen.

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – Earlier this year, the jungle city of Manaus sent shockwaves across the globe when hospitals ran out of oxygen with lethal consequences – turning the city into the world’s COVID-19 epicentre. Two months on, Brazil’s COVID catastrophe has never been worse. Now, with new coronavirus variants and a series of grim records of deaths and infections, there are fears that a lack of oxygen supplies seen in Manaus, the Amazonas state capital, could unfold elsewhere. Brazil is approaching 300,000 COVID deaths and it set another weekly record last week with 2,255 deaths and 513,408 new cases, according to Johns Hopkins University. Amid this surge, Fiocruz epidemiologist Jesem Orellana told Al Jazeera that a lack of sufficient oxygen, intubation drugs and medical supplies could push Brazil’s hospitals closer to collapse in the coming weeks.