President Andrés Manuel López Obrador maintains his agenda of events and this Wednesday, the 82nd Anniversary of the Petroleum Expropriation in the Pemex Tower of Mexico City, attended dozens of people, sitting next to each other.
This, despite the fact that the health authorities have recommended measures such as keeping a distance of at least one and a half meters between people, to prevent covid-19 infections.
President López Obrador promised that the event on Wednesday and which he plans for the Oaxaca weekend would seek to have as few people as possible, “so as not to give rise to the questions that the president is not setting an example or not taking care of himself”.
However, the images disseminated by the presidency itself about the commemoration event show that attendees, among oil workers, were sitting side by side.
An honor to have attended the historic celebration of the 82nd Anniversary of the Oil Expropriation.
With President @lopezobrador_ and @GobiernoMX colleagues pic.twitter.com/9sVi6lvk8Q
— Irma Eréndira Sandoval B. (@Irma_Sandoval) March 18, 2020
López Obrador continued with the hand-held greeting, although Health’s recommendation is to avoid it, to prevent contagion of the virus. In the images, we see the moment he greeted the Secretary of Security, Alfonso Durazo, and the director of Pemex, Octavio Romero.
At a press conference on March 14, the Undersecretary of Prevention and Health Promotion, Hugo López-Gatell, explained why it is necessary to keep a distance of one and a half meters, to avoid spreading or infecting others of COVID-19.
An important transmission mechanism, he said, is saliva drops.
“Those aren’t so microscopic, sometimes you can see them,” he said.
“Same thing, when you talk, cough, scream or sing, the drops are projected, at what distance?, on average about three meters, hardly more than three meters, even if I gave a strong sneeze, you who are about six meters in the front row (he told the conference attendees at the National Palace) it would not reach, much less to those who are in the back, but people who were closer if I sneezed this way will reach them and they
This March 18, the country surpassed the 100 COVID-19 contagion, a disease that has resulted in the worldwide deaths of more than 8,700 people.
President López Obrador has faced criticism because in the midst of the pandemic emergency he has not stopped his tours or events, even hugging and kissing the people who come up to greet him.
A video even showed how the chief executive refused to wear antibacterial gel, before starting his morning conference, even though it has been a basic care recommendation to constantly wash his hands.
In the face of criticism, the federal representative has responded that he will stop his events when López-Gatell tells him, when the time is right, since for the time being the country is still in phase 1 of transmission of the disease, and only imported contagions have been given, that is, from people who traveled abroad and were then diagnosed in Mexico.
Asked by the press about why López Obrador does not conform to the recommendations of healthy distance and of avoiding hand greetings or kisses, López-Gatell mentioned that “the strength of the president is moral, it is not a force of contagion”, which also provoked criticism on social networks and the opposition, noting that the president should give an example of the care needed to deal with the pandemic.
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