Peru is cosplaying it's way to the vaccination drive
Peru has been on the headlines trough the COVID-19 pandemic for different reasons. At the beginning it was seen as a country which took a hardline lockdown then for being the country with the highest excess deaths per capita in the world because of the pandemic. Yet despite such tragedy the focus then move on Pedro Castillo the peasant/teacher from rural Peru who did an anti-establishment campaign fusing the promise of a stronger state, social conservatism and deregulation of the informal economy won the presidential elections despite the opposition from the elite.
Pedro Castillo’s promise was “no more poor people in a rich country”. The economic indicators are far from the doom that right-wingers predicted he even yet the prospects of growth remain limited but according to Bloomberg tracker by the 31 of December of 2021, Peru had reach 73,3% of it’s population fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Those statistics put it above Germany, United Kingdom, Taiwan, Switzerland, Israel and United States.
While vaccinations had started before Pedro Castillo assumed office it had a rough start lately than other countries in the region even if it was at that point the most affected country in the world by the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet Pedro Castillo naming Hernando Cevallos as Health Minister was a shift. He was a doctor who had been a union leader as well as former Congressman knew well the limits of the Peruvian public health care sector but he understood that vaccinations was the key and that there were not apologies to made that if something the vaccination drive should be the focus and it was.
The Vacunatón/Vacunafest was developed before Pedro Castillo took office but it was supported with emphasis by Hernando Cevallos. The original concept was that in the weekends vaccination centers not only attend in the regular schedule but for extended hours. Some regular people had been going to vaccine in costumes in a way to put emphasis on the message of hope as well as trying to share the photo/video of the vaccination in social media to motivate people to get vaccinated. But by the time that Pedro Castillo and Hernando Cevallos had assumed office there was a opening.
The vaccination process had been strictly by age as the vaccination age was lowering it was likely more young people familiar with superhero movies and animes would be going to the vaccination centers so the Ministry of Health cease the opportunity and decided to organize costume competitions inside the vaccination centers. Which made the Vacunatón/Vacunafest to be associated with festive atmosphere full of people in cosplay.
Yet that by itself wasn’t enough so the Ministry of Health put forward a drive to try to found people that hadn’t been vaccinated from street sellers to homeless people the idea was to vaccinate everyone in the cities as well as in the most remote areas of Peru even if previous polls had shown higher distrust to the vaccines against COVID-19 now Peru is among the most vaccinated countries in the world thanks to the heroic work of healthcare workers who have been doing everything possible to make the vaccination drive a success.
The Peruvian public healthcare system remains weak and with what appears as the third wave happening the challenges ahead are enormous. Yet Peru had started vaccinations to teens and when the Omicron variant was detected in the country it accelerated the availability of booster shots to all adults. This year it will start administering the vaccine to kids as well as the consideration of a second booster is currently been evaluated by the Ministry of Health.
Peru’s vaccination might seen particularly colorful but in some ways it share a lot of elements with vaccination process around Latin America which is the most vaccinated region around the world since the hope that vaccines had given in the region were bigger than any complication. Also worth pointing out cosplaying was also part of the vaccination process in other countries in the region even if many times a much more localized within a particular city while in Peru it was national.
Masks and costumes in Peru had a long tradition going back to pre-colonial times to the colonial celebrations of carnivals to more recently the popularity of cosplay. The logic of hiding/showing is quite good representation about the contradictory Peruvian identity were the mystery of an ancient origin remains in the conscience. But they might have now contributed a bit in another Peruvian tradition which is to learn how to survive in the most adverse conditions.