After vaccinating 95 percent of adults, a Brazilian city is returning to normal
COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths dipped following mass vaccination of adults in Serrana
In Serrana, Brazil, schools are reopening and plans are under way for a large open-air concert. Health care workers suddenly have time for sit-down meals rather than rushing to grab street food during a spare free moment. These scenes approaching normalcy stand in stark contrast to what’s happening across the rest of the country, where hospitals are jam-packed, businesses are largely closed and 2,000 people are dying each day from COVID-19.
Serrana, a city of 45,600 in the state of São Paulo, can begin to make these plans because an experiment called Projeto S, which vaccinated nearly all adults, appears to be drastically reducing COVID-19-related hospitalizations and deaths there.
Symptomatic cases have dropped 80 percent, with hospital admissions down 86 percent, down from a peak of around 600 cases per 100,000 people in early March, Projeto S leaders announced at a news conference on May 31. By two weeks after the second shot, only two fully vaccinated people landed in the hospital with COVID-19.
The incidence of COVID-19–related deaths per 100,000 inhabitants also dropped 95 percent in the city, the team leaders said, although the raw data behind the numbers has yet to be released. In April, the city recorded only six COVID-19 deaths, according to the Health Secretariat of Serrana.