The Pan American Health Organization issued an epidemic warning as the worst yellow fever outbreak in decades spread across South America.
Though the number of cases remains relatively low — 320 have been reported — infections are exceptionally deadly, with around 40% of confirmed cases succumbing to the disease.
“We’re facing a complicated situation,” a health expert in Colombia, the worst-affected nation, told El País. And with urban areas increasingly encroaching into jungles, other mosquito-borne diseases will spread easily too, experts said, amid warnings the region’s health systems are woefully unprepared for mass outbreaks: Latin America accounted for 15% of global excess mortality during the COVID-19 pandemic despite having only 8% of the world’s population.