You can expect delays with Mexico's postal service.
It took 116 days for a letter mailed through the Mexican postal service to get from Monterrey, Nuevo León, to Dallas, Texas, the newspaper Reforma reported.
And that was after paying for “rapid delivery.”
Mexico’s notoriously slow mail service was the focus of an experiment by newspaper staff, who mailed the letter on August 25 as an experiment to test the post office’s efficiency. The letter finally arrived at its destination in Dallas — ironically with two postmark stickers bearing images of turtles — on Saturday, four months later.
Other letters were sent at the regular price to the municipalities of Allende, Nuevo León, Múzquiz, Coahuila, and even to a neighborhood in west Monterrey but they have yet to arrive despite being guaranteed delivery within two weeks.
The address in the Monterrey neighborhood to which the letter was sent is only 15 kilometers from the post office where reporters dropped it off.
The letter to Dallas, Reforma said, apparently did not even leave the Monterrey office where it was dropped off until September 11, i.e., 17 days after it was given to postal staff.
The newspaper also highlighted the story of Ernesto Rowe, an American citizen who tried to vote by absentee ballot in the recent U.S. presidential election but was unable to after his mailed-in ballot ended up in limbo in a post office in Mexico City.
Correos Mexico has suffered under competition from private mail services and the technological advances that has reduced the use of postal services around the world. Nevertheless, Reforma said, its snail’s pace is an issue in light of the fact that it managed a budget of 5.4 billion pesos this year. In a recent tour Reforma staff took of post offices in Mexico City, Monterrey, and Guadalajara, they found little had been done to modernize operations or provide better service.
The coronavirus risk level in Acapulco has been downgraded to yellow light “medium” even though the resort city leads Guerrero for confirmed cases.
The federal government announced Friday that the risk level in Guerrero would remain orange light “high” for another two weeks but Governor Héctor Astudillo said Sunday that Acapulco, along with state capital Chilpancingo and the coastal municipality of Zihuatanejo – which rank second and third, respectively, for confirmed cases – would be yellow on the state stoplight map as of Monday and until January 10.
Astudillo said the coronavirus numbers for the three locations allowed the government to take the decision — clearly economically-motivated — to make those three municipalities yellow. The other 78 municipalities in Guerrero will remain orange, he said.
Acapulco and Zihuatanejo are Guerrero’s main tourism destinations while Chilpancingo is the state’s second largest city and an important commercial center.
As a result of their yellow designation, hotels in those cities can operate at 70% capacity whereas those in the rest of the state are limited to a 50% maximum. Public transit in the three yellow municipalities can operate at 60% capacity; services in the rest of Guerrero are limited to 50%.
Governor Astudillo said Covid numbers permitted the relaxation of restrictions.
Astudillo said there is a serious coronavirus problem in Guerrero but added that the state cannot deny its tourism vocation.
“We’re an attractive [tourism] hub and we can’t close the highways so that they [tourists] don’t come. What we can do is take care of ourselves and … take care of others,” he said.
“The most complex thing is finding the balance between health and the economy; of course the most important thing is health,” the governor added.
Some 700,000 tourists were expected to flock to Acapulco over the Christmas-New Year vacation period even before Astudillo announced that hotels could increase their occupancy from 50% to 70%. The resort city is now likely to be even busier given that hotels will have more rooms to offer visitors. Acapulco is especially popular with residents of Mexico City, the country’s coronavirus epicenter, heightening the risk of transmission over the holidays.
The southern state has recorded just over 25,000 confirmed coronavirus cases, including almost 11,000 in Acapulco, more than 4,600 in Chilpancingo and almost 1,600 in Zihuatanejo. Guerrero’s official Covid-19 death toll is 2,526.
• Another state gearing up for an influx of tourists is Baja California Sur (BCS). Authorities there have made the use of face masks mandatory in all public places and workplaces while meetings and gatherings of more than 15 people are prohibited.
People who violate health rules face fines and/or other sanctions such as orders to complete community work.
BCS has the highest number of active cases in Mexico on a per capita basis with 108.5 case per 100,000 residents. The state currently has 990 active cases, according to Health Ministry estimates.
It has recorded 16,377 confirmed cases since the beginning of the pandemic and 738 Covid-19 deaths.
Ponche navideño is Mexico's version of holiday punch.
Holidays are always a good time to add something new and festive to the table, don’t you think? In Mexico, the winter holidays stretch from December 12, the Festival of the Virgin of Guadalupe, to the Day of the Magi on January 6. I’ve lived in neighborhoods where posadas moved from house to house during that time, and also on one street that was closed each evening so that everyone could gather outside with their neighbors, sharing food and drink, prayers and song.
While this year posadas will most likely be curtailed, there’s no reason why you can’t celebrate in your own home with your own “pod” of people. Ponche navideño and rompope (Mexican eggnog) are both traditional drinks at this time of year and are easily made. Yes, you can buy both drinks bottled, but homemade tastes so much better.
Rompope comes from the Spanish ponche de huevo (literally “egg punch”). Legend says an order of nuns in Puebla came up with the recipe in the 17th century, but their “secret ingredient” remains unknown to this day. (Could it be ground almonds? I wonder …) Rich and velvety, rompope can be served either warm or cold.
Every area of Mexico, and maybe even every family, has its own recipe for Ponche navideño. It’s kind of like mulled wine — fresh and dried fruits and spices simmered in a sweetened alcohol base. It also includes tejocotes (hawthorn fruit), sugarcane, hibiscus flowers and tamarind. The combination is high in Vitamin A and Vitamin C — exactly what we need during the chilly winter months.
While different versions of ponche are served throughout Central and South America, it actually comes from India, where it’s called “pãc,” meaning “five.” That’s based on the five ingredients in any punch: sour, sweet, liquor, water and spice. The British called it “punch,” which became the Spanish ponche.
This variation of ponche features jamaica (hibiscus flowers).
Tejocotes are an unusual fruit you may not have encountered before. The size of a large grape, they look like a crabapple and are yellow or orange. If you find fresh ones, they need to be blanched and peeled, as the skin is quite bitter. They’re also available in jars or frozen, already peeled. If you can’t find them, substitute an Asian pear cut into cubes. Also, tamarind paste can be used instead of fresh tamarind pods. Serve Ponche Navideño garnished with a cinnamon stick and with a spoon so that you can eat the chopped fruit at the bottom of the cup!
Rompope Tradicional
2/3 cup blanched almonds
1½ cups + 2 Tbsp. granulated sugar, divided
6 cups whole milk
2 cinnamon sticks
Rind of 1 lemon
1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
¼ tsp. baking soda
8 egg yolks
1 cup white rum or aguardiente
In food processor or blender, pulse almonds with 2 Tbsp. of the sugar until ground to a fine paste. Bring milk, cinnamon, lemon rind, vanilla and baking soda to a boil over medium-high heat in a large heavy-bottomed saucepan. Reduce to medium-low; simmer for 15–20 minutes. Set aside.
In large bowl, whisk egg yolks, remaining 1½ cups sugar, and ground almond/sugar mixture until thick and pale. Remove cinnamon sticks and lemon rind from milk mix and discard. Whisking constantly, slowly add the milk mixture to yolk mixture.
Return mixture to pan. Cook carefully over low heat, stirring and scraping pan, until thickened, 5–7 minutes. Cool completely, about 2 hours. Add alcohol before serving.
Orange Rompope
8 cups milk
1 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
Peel from 1 orange
8-12 egg yolks (adjusted to thickness and richness you prefer)
2 cups heavy cream or half and half
1 cup condensed milk
Rum
Combine milk with sugar, vanilla and orange peel in a pot and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low; cook about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent burning. Set aside.
Blend or whisk egg yolks with condensed milk until combined. Add cream or half and half and whisk or mix again.
Add a cup of the milk mixture to the egg mix and stir, then add remaining egg mix to milk mixture. Return to heat and cook on low, stirring constantly until mix starts to thicken. (Don’t let it boil.)
Cool completely; stir in alcohol. Refrigerate until ready to serve, warm or cold.
The secret ingredient to this ponche is tejocote (hawthorn fruit).
Ponche Navideño
This is a basic recipe — feel free to fiddle with the amounts of the ingredients.
10 cups water
½ cup jamaica (dried hibiscus flowers)
3 tamarind pods, shell removed
3 small piloncillo cones
8-10 guavas, washed, ends trimmed and halved
8-10 tejocotes OR 1 cup Asian pear, cubed
1 orange, cut into quarters, with skin
1 red apple, cubed small
2 pears, cubed small
1½ cups cubed, peeled sugarcane
7-10 pitted prunes, chopped
Handful of raisins
3-4 cinnamon sticks
4-8 cloves
Brandy or rum
Put water in a large pot; add peeled tamarind pods and jamaica. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10–15 minutes. Remove from stove; strain out the hibiscus and tamarind pods. Put liquid back into the pot.
Push cloves into oranges. (So you can find and remove them later.) If using fresh tejocotes, prepare them as explained above.
Add oranges and all remaining ingredients except alcohol, to the pot. Cover and simmer 30–45 minutes, stirring occasionally, until fruit is tender and piloncillo dissolves. Remove cloves from oranges, returning fruit to pot. Add alcohol individually to each cup when serving.
Janet Blaser has been a writer, editor and storyteller her entire life and feels fortunate to be able to write about great food, amazing places, fascinating people and unique events. Why We Left: An Anthology of American Women Expats is her first book.
The federal government allegedly lied about hospital occupancy levels and the coronavirus positivity rate in Mexico City to avoid having to designate the capital as a red light “maximum” risk state at the start of December.
The government uses 10 different indicators to determine the stoplight color allocated to each of Mexico’s 32 states.
Two of the indicators are hospital occupancy and the coronavirus positivity rate – the percentage of Covid-19 tests that come back positive.
On December 4, Deputy Health Minister Hugo López-Gatell, the federal government’s coronavirus point man, signed a document notifying Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum about the risk level in the capital, The New York Times reported. It was announced that day that Mexico City would remain at the orange light “high” risk level.
In the document, the federal government claimed that 45% of beds with ventilators in the capital were in use, the Times reported. However, official data showed that 58% of such beds were occupied.
The document López-Gatell sent to Sheinbaum also said the positivity rate in Mexico City at the end of November was 25%. But official data showed that the rate was in fact above 35%.
The Times said that if the government used the higher official data rather than the lower figures – whose source is unknown – Mexico City would have reached a score of 33 on the stoplight system. (A state is allocated points for each of the 10 indicators.)
By using the lower bed occupancy and positivity rates, the federal government was able to keep Mexico City’s risk score below the 32-point threshold that triggers a red light declaration.
The Times said in a report published Monday that in response to its repeated requests for information, “government officials would not explain where the unaccountably lower numbers came from.”
The government’s apparent fudging of figures makes a mockery of its stoplight system, which was supposed to provide an objective assessment of the coronavirus risk level.
A large crowd in Mexico City’s historic center on Saturday.
“They have deliberately tried to hide the emergency,” Xavier Tello, a Mexico City-based health policy analyst, told the Times.
“Every day they delayed the decision [to declare Mexico City red], more people were exposed,” he said.
“We are alone, the federal government isn’t helping us — they’re actually taking this lightly,” said Diana Banderas, a Mexico City doctor who treats coronavirus patients. “Now, we are collapsing.”
The government’s motivation for fudging figures and thus avoiding an economic lockdown in the nation’s capital and largest city, at least for two weeks, is clear – it didn’t want to inflict more financial pain on citizens who have already suffered extensively in 2020.
López-Gatell has consistently maintained that strict lockdowns are not viable in Mexico because of the country’s high levels of inequality. Not going out to work on a daily basis means not eating for many people who live hand to mouth.
Sheinbaum also said that her government tried to avoid an end-of-year economic shutdown because “this time of year is really important in terms of families’ finances.”
“We are doing everything within reach, absolutely everything to avoid a situation in which we have to shut down all activities,” she said before Friday’s announcement that the capital was turning red.
The trade-off in delaying a shutdown – deceitfully, it appears – is that more people are placed at risk of contracting the coronavirus, ending up in hospital or even dying.
As is the case around the world, government-mandated coronavirus restrictions have their supporters and detractors.
While health workers are understandably strong proponents of lockdown orders, many workers in Mexico’s vast informal are less enthusiastic.
“As much as the government might want to send us back into isolation, I think the economy here in Mexico wouldn’t allow it,” Óscar Gutiérrez, a Mexico City flower vendor, told the Times.
People are prepared to risk exposure to the virus to ensure they and their families don’t go hungry, he said.
“You’ll die of one thing or the other,” Gutiérrez said. “I’m going to work as long as they let me.”
López Obrador and Biden: 'new stage in the bilateral relationship.'
President López Obrador and United States President-elect Joe Biden committed to work together for the good of Mexico and the U.S. during a telephone conversation on Saturday.
“From the historic town hall of Valladolid, Yucatán, I’ve spoken by telephone with the president-elect of the United States Joseph Biden. We reaffirmed the commitment to work together for the wellbeing of our people and nations,” López Obrador said on Twitter.
The conversation between the two men took place five days after AMLO, as the president is best known, finally congratulated Biden on his victory in last month’s presidential election. López Obrador decided to hold off on congratulating the former U.S. vice president until the Electoral College confirmed his victory over Donald Trump.
Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard, who accompanied López Obrador during his call to Biden, said the conversation between the pair was “cordial” and that there will be “broad bilateral cooperation and a very good relationship between the presidents of Mexico and the United states.”
In another tweet, Ebrard said that “a new stage in the bilateral relationship” will soon begin.
Biden’s transition team published a readout of the conversation between the president-elect and López Obrador, which said that the former thanked the latter for his congratulations and “expressed his commitment to build a strong relationship with Mexico on a foundation of respect for the rule of law and advancing shared values.”
It also said that Biden “emphasized the need to reinvigorate U.S.-Mexico cooperation to ensure safe and orderly migration, contain Covid-19, revitalize the economies of North America, and secure our common border.”
The president-elect and López Obrador noted a shared desire to address the root causes of migration in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and southern Mexico, the readout said.
Large numbers of people from those three Central American countries have traveled through Mexico to seek asylum in the United States since López Obrador took office in late 2018. The arrival of so-called migrant caravans on the Mexico-United States border angered Trump, prompting him to threaten to impose tariffs on Mexican goods if the Mexican government didn’t do more to stop the people flows.
Biden and López Obrador expressed their desire “to build a future of greater opportunity and security for the region” in order to deter migration.
“They discussed working together on a new approach to regional migration that offers alternatives to undertaking the dangerous journey to the United States,” the readout said.
The president-elect “pledged to work closely with Mexico and other regional partners — including civil society, the private sector, international organizations, and governments — during the early months of his administration to build the regional and border infrastructure and capacity needed to facilitate a new orderly and humane approach to migration that will respect international norms regarding the treatment of asylum claims.”
Biden will be inaugurated as U.S. president on January 20 for a four-year term to conclude in January 2025. By that time, López Obrador’s successor will have been sworn in as Mexico’s 66th president.
President López Obrador has proposed that a state-owned company managed by the armed forces operate three sections of the Maya Train railroad and four airports, including the new one at Mexico City.
Speaking in Tulum, Quintana Roo, on Sunday, the president said the government is considering giving a military-managed state company responsibility for the Maya Train sections between Tulum and Palenque, Chiapas.
He said the government is also looking at giving the armed forces control of the Felipe Ángeles airport, currently under construction by the military at the Santa Lucía Air Force base north of Mexico City, the Tulum airport, which will be built by the army and is slated to open in 2023, and the airports in the Quintana Roo capital of Chetumal and Palenque.
The Chetumal airport is currently operated by Airports and Auxiliary Services, a federal government corporation, while the Palenque facility is operated by a company jointly owned by the federal and Chiapas governments.
López Obrador said that one objective of giving control of the Tulum-Palenque stretch of the Maya Train to a military-managed company is to ensure that the 1,500-kilometer railroad is not privatized at any point in the future.
“We have to protect this project so that there is no temptation to privatize it,” he said.
The president added that the operation of the Maya Train, which will run through Tabasco, Campeche, Yucatán, Quintana Roo and Chiapas, will fund the pensions of marines and soldiers.
López Obrador said that a second objective of the plan is to guarantee the security of the projects and the region through which the Maya Train will run.
The president has depended heavily on the military since he took office in December 2018. In addition to using the armed forces for public security tasks, he has entrusted the construction of several infrastructure projects and the control of the nation’s ports and customs offices to them.
The president’s reliance on the military has been widely criticized, especially because he pledged to gradually withdraw the army and navy from the streets. His proposal to put the armed forces in charge of the Maya Train and four airports triggered more criticism.
The newspaper Reforma, which is frequently critical of the president, said in an editorial that giving the military control of the Maya Train would be “illegal, neoliberal and even dangerous.”
Protesters who want the Maya Train’s route shifted await the president in Campeche.
It would be illegal, the newspaper said, because decisions about “the use and allocation of public resources” correspond to the lower house of Congress, not the executive power.
It would be neoliberal – López Obrador, commonly known as AMLO, says he is staunchly opposed to neoliberalism, blaming the doctrine for all manner of problems his government inherited from its predecessors – because the state-owned company proposed by AMLO “falls into the same category” as the state firm that manages the Veracruz port, of which he has been critical, Reforma said.
The newspaper said it would be dangerous because “the role and mission of the armed forces is not to do business but rather defend sovereignty.”
“It’s curious that the plan proposed by López Obrador appears to be a copy of the Military Social Welfare Institute of Nicaragua, supposedly created to guarantee the pensions of soldiers but which has ended up turning into a conglomerate of companies, opacity and corruption,” Reforma said.
“And it’s not a coincidence that [Nicaraguan President] Daniel Ortega has remained in power for 13 years by blood and fire thanks to the support of the armed forces, which [control] financial, insurance, agricultural, hardware, hotel and real estate development businesses and even supermarkets [in Nicaragua].”
Similarly, a columnist for the El Universal newspaper wrote that López Obrador’s aim in giving the military an ever-growing list of responsibilities is to “reward” it and ensure that it never opposes him or his political movement – the ruling Morena party.
“However, things could go wrong because not even the army and the navy themselves are sure they can fulfill the whims of the executive,” Mario Maldonado said in a column published Monday.
He also said that López Obrador’s heavy reliance on the military prevents private companies from participating in many large infrastructure projects. (The military is building a chain of government-owned banks in addition to sections of the Maya Train and the Santa Lucía airport, and is also responsible for distributing medications and school textbooks among other non-traditional tasks.)
“Putting the private sector to one side in the main government [infrastructure] projects is another breaking point between President López Obrador and businesspeople, who amid the Covid-19 economic debacle and the lack of stimulus from the federal government are suffering the worst crisis in recent history,” Maldonado wrote.
“In 2020, construction GDP will plummet 15%, the worst decline in the past 25 years, causing the doors of some 2,000 companies in the sector to close. That will leave at least 140,000 workers unemployed,” he said.
Maldonado noted that construction sector GDP fell 5% in 2019 despite the absence of an economic crisis, attributing the poor performance to uncertainty generated by the federal government and “the army’s meddling in infrastructure projects.”
He wrote that never before has the army had so many responsibilities or managed such large projects.
The Maya Train will run through five states in Mexico’s southeast.
“The projects it is in charge of represent investment in excess of 500 billion pesos [US $25 billion]. But the economic power of the armed forces is a double-edged sword for AMLO: on one side, the opacity in the management of resources could cause corruption scandals for the 4T [Fourth Transformation],” Maldonado wrote, referring to the government by its self-anointed nickname.
On the other side, he continued, the pressure on the ministries of National Defense and the Navy, “which don’t have the technological resources or management capacity” to execute the projects entrusted to them, could cause an explosion “against the president.”
“Whatever happens, the interference of the armed forces in the economic projects represents a serious problem for the government with businesspeople and investors,” Maldonado said.
Before it can hand control of the Maya Train to a military-managed state company, the government first has to build the new railroad — and overcome significant opposition.
A judge in Campeche this month granted a suspension order against the 222-kilometer stretch of tracks between Escárcega, Campeche, and Calkiní in the same state. The judge ruled that construction of the section could cause irreparable damage to the environment.
Members of a collective of residents intercepted a vehicle in which López Obrador was traveling through Campeche on Saturday to deliver a letter in which they asked for section 2 of the project to run along an alternative route.
They told the president that they are not opposed to the Maya Train project per se but fear they could be evicted from their homes and land due to construction of its Escárcega-Calkiní section.
“Each of the residents have different positions but we all agree on defending our assets and the neighborhoods we’ve lived in for so many generations,” the letter said.
Several suspension orders have been granted against construction of the railroad, the government’s signature infrastructure project, but a federal court revoked one in May after it was challenged by the National Tourism Promotion Fund, which is managing the 1,500-kilometer project.
Critics, including many indigenous groups, say that the construction and operation of the railroad will harm the environment and pose a threat to people’s traditional way of life.
A waterfall jumper during a Tribu Wounaan excursion at the Oro River earlier this week.
Four people are dead and three are missing after members of a group of outdoor enthusiasts in San Andrés Tuxtla were dragged away Sunday evening by strong currents during a flash flood in the Oro River Canyon.
According to authorities, the levels of the Oro River, where the group of 21 was camping and engaging in outdoor adventure activities, had risen due to heavy rains, overwhelming members of the group and sweeping them away.
As of Monday afternoon, rescuers had recovered the bodies of four people and were searching for three more, Civil Protection authorities said. They found five group members alive but injured around midnight on Sunday and took them to a hospital in Catemaco.
While authorities continued searching for the other three until dawn, darkness and the heavy rains interfered.
The victims, from various municipalities of Veracruz as well as from Mexico City, were participating in an excursion with the Tribu Wounaan Tourism and Adventure Sports Company, which had scheduled activities such as camping, rappelling from heights of up to 24 meters, rock climbing, and waterfall jumping in the Oro River Canyon.
According to the company’s social media page, it had scheduled the tour to celebrate its recent win for best tourism product from “Mi Veracruz,” the state tourism and culture ministry’s annual awards for Veracruz tourism industry businesses. Tribu Wounaan organizers chose the Oro River Canyon because it was the site of their award-winning tourism product.
Mexico City got its first openly gay commanding officer after Javier Berain took office earlier this month as the police department’s new general director of transit policing.
Berain has 800 officers under his command.
Berain told the newspaper Milenio that it was an honor to be the first openly gay person trained to take on a command position on on the city’s police force. He also pointed out that it was a particular victory for the LGBT+ community because in the past “the police were precisely the instrument that fomented discrimination and the repression of sexual dissidence in this city.”
“I’m honored … to go from activism in which we asked that they stop oppressing us to commanding and being in charge of the leadership of an institution once used to oppress [us],” Berain said.
Berain took the job on December 10, the day after he graduated from the police department’s officer training academy, a ceremony in which he was personally congratulated by Police Chief Omar García Harfuch.
“He has a firm, unwavering commitment to making any upstanding citizen from the LGBT+ community part of the police force if they have the call to service,” Berain said of García. “They always will be welcome.”
On his Twitter account on December 9, García congratulated Berain, saying, “Your integrity will give rapid results in this area that we are restructuring.”
Asked if his appointment meant that machismo and discrimination had been eliminated in the city’s governmental institutions, Berain pointed to the advances they have made in the last few decades.
“We’ve advanced pretty well as institutions compared to 20–30 years ago,” Berain said. “Now there’s not open discrimination. I’m not going to lose my job for being homosexual. That would have happened 30 or 40 years ago.”
He had never experienced discrimination personally, he said, although he added that he couldn’t speak for the 70,000 people who work with him on the force.
Berain stopped short of painting a completely rosy picture for the LGBT+ community and for women in the city’s government institutions, saying that discrimination and “macho microaggressions” still exist, but they push minority groups to keep fighting to end discrimination.
But he did say that he believed members of the LGBT+ community should feel safe when reporting a crime to the city’s police department.
“The [police department] attends to everyone equally, independent of their sexual preference or gender identity,” he said. “In addition, members of the community may need special attention and for that there are protocols within the institution and we have the special unit for sexual diversity, simply to avoid situations of revictimization and fitting service for those who need it.”
Berain told Milenio that he felt certain he has the respect of the officers under his command.
“But the most important thing for them is that we give them the tools to do their job effectively,” he said.
A couple share a moment of grief in Mexico City. Mexico's official death toll stands at 118,202.
The Mexico City government has called for citizens to go into “total isolation” as hospitals in the capital come under intense pressure due to an increase in the hospitalization of coronavirus patients.
“Covid-19 emergency. The hospitals are at their limit. Return to total isolation,” the government said in a cell phone message sent to residents on Saturday, the day red light restrictions took effect.
“Only essential sectors are open from today. Don’t go out. No parties.”
Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum has blamed a recent increase of both coronavirus cases and hospitalizations in the capital on people’s attendance at parties and large family gatherings.
Just over 85% of general care beds set aside for coronavirus patients in Mexico City are currently occupied, according to federal data, while 74% of those with ventilators are in use.
Accumulated Covid cases by state as of Sunday night. milenio
There were just over 5,000 coronavirus patients in Mexico City hospitals on Sunday night, including 1,280 on ventilators.
Many hospitals in Mexico City and the surrounding metropolitan area of México state, which has also switched to red on the federal government’s stoplight map, are completely full.
There were fewer than 700 general care hospital beds available in the capital on Sunday and just 365 intensive care beds, Sheinbaum said. Family members of some extremely sick coronavirus patients have found that locating an available bed is extremely difficult.
The Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS), a major public healthcare provider, said on the weekend that its hospitals in the greater Mexico City metropolitan area have reached capacity.
Medical personnel at the IMSS La Raza National Medical Center in the capital’s north end told the newspaper Reforma that when intubated Covid-19 patients die, their beds and the ventilators they were connected to are immediately occupied by new patients.
Raúl Palafox, a nurse, said that many coronavirus patients are arriving at La Raza in a very serious condition and require immediate intubation. Some die shortly after they arrive, he said, adding that admissions to the facility and deaths have increased in the past two weeks.
“Up to eight patients are dying in a single shift,” Palafox said.
He said that the hospital is understaffed, explaining that only 60% of medical personnel are currently working because they are in isolation at home or on end-of-year vacations.
The IMSS has acknowledged its staffing problems in the Mexico City metropolitan area, announcing that health workers from states with lower numbers of hospitalized coronavirus patients will be transferred to the capital.
“In the coming days, 640 doctors and nurses from all over the country, especially the southeast, will arrive,” said director Zoé Robledo.
Hospitals in Mexico City operated by other public healthcare providers including the State Workers Social Security Institute, the federal Ministry of Defense and local and federal health ministries are also under severe pressure.
Admissions of coronavirus patients at the General Hospital of Mexico, operated by the federal Health Ministry, began increasing in the middle of November, and the facility is now at saturation point.
Coronavirus cases and deaths in Mexico as reported by day. milenio
Workers say that many patients are arriving when they are extremely ill or even after they have passed away.
“Two dead patients arrived … [last] week,” one health worker told Reforma. “They arrive without vital signs; they’re dead when they arrive but their family members don’t realize.”
The health worker said that some patients remain in the hospital’s emergency department for up to a week because there are no beds available in the Covid ward. The medical personnel are exhausted, he added.
Despite the authorities’ appeal for Mexico City residents to stay at home, large numbers of people flocked to the capital’s downtown area on Saturday. Reforma reported that some nonessential businesses such as shoes, clothing and toy stores and Christmas decoration retailers defied the government’s order to close their doors.
Police officer Guillermo Salinas said it wasn’t easy to keep people a safe distance from each other with so many nonchalant shoppers in the streets.
“We came to … stop people crowding together but they don’t understand,” he said. “They keep coming in [to the historic center] and they don’t wear face masks. It’s very bad.”
Many other states are also facing difficult situations due to a recent spike in case numbers and hospitalizations.
In addition to Mexico City and México state, Baja California is currently classified as a red light “maximum” risk state while 24 states are at the orange light “high” risk level.
Occupancy of general care hospital beds is 78% in Baja California and México state, 71% in Guanajuato, 66% in Hidalgo and 63% in Nuevo León, according to federal data.
There are almost 90,000 active coronavirus cases across the country, according to Health Ministry estimates, and the accumulated case tally stands at 1.32 million after an additional 6,870 cases were reported Sunday.
The official Covid-19 death toll is 118,202, including 326 additional fatalities registered on Sunday. Mexico City’s death toll passed 20,000 on Sunday while there have been more than 13,300 fatalities in neighboring México state, which includes many municipalities that are part of the capital’s metropolitan area.
Mexico City leads the country for estimated active cases with almost 36,000 – a figure that is likely a significant underestimate – while México state ranks second with more than 9,600.
Estimated active cases across the country as of Sunday night. milenio
Active case numbers are in the thousands in many other states including Guanajuato, Nuevo León, Baja California, Coahuila, Sonora, Jalisco, Tabasco and Querétaro.
Authorities in Querétaro, an orange light state where hospital occupancy is just under 50% for both general care and critical care beds, announced that tighter restrictions would take effect Monday due to rising case numbers and hospitalizations.
Retail stores and shopping centers are now limited to 30% capacity and must close by 5:00 p.m., cantinas and bars are prohibited from opening and restaurants are required to close their doors by 8:00 p.m and mustn’t exceed 50% capacity. The sale of alcohol after 8:00 p.m. and all day Saturday and Sunday is banned.
Gyms are also limited to 30% capacity and customers must make a prior appointment before their workouts. Social gatherings of more than 25 people are banned and must conclude by 8:00 p.m.
Querétaro is one of six states that are at risk of regressing to red on the stoplight map, health official Ricardo Cortés said Friday. The others are Sonora, Zacatecas (red for the past two weeks), Guanajuato, Aguascalientes and Hidalgo.
The economic restrictions in Mexico City and México state are not scheduled to ease until January 11. They could be extended if the shutdown doesn’t succeed in driving case numbers and hospitalizations down. That is a real possibility as many people are likely to defy recommendations and gather with their extended families and friends for Christmas and New Year’s celebrations.
Juan Rocha's livelihood selling handmade amaranth sweets has all but disappeared.
As we bump along the edge of the canyon road, it feels and sounds like Juan Rocha’s ’84 VW bus is leaving parts of itself behind. The ride down to his land – seven hectares sitting on the edge of a valley in a rural part of Santa Cruz Acalpixca – is so noisy that there’s no use in trying to talk or even think. Instead, we look out the window at the scruffy land below, scruffy now because it’s the heart of the dry season and most of the vegetation, including the corn yet to be harvested, has turned a dusty tan.
As the dust swirls away from the opening bus doors, we are met with a view that expands across a checkerboard valley that includes dozens of small farms like his.
“If you saw this land in the rainy season you would never want to leave,” says Juan. Even in the dry season, it’s beautiful.
The trip out is one that Juan usually takes on horseback from his house in the pueblo of Santa Cruz Acalpixca at the southern edge of Mexico City. His gentle-faced horse, Muñeca (Doll), is his companion most days out in the fields that have been worked by his family for three generations.
The main crops are corn and amaranth, a pseudo grain endemic to Mexico. There are also a handful of staples the family grows for its own consumption. Juan and his wife, Alva, both come from families that have grown amaranth in Mexico City and Michoacán for generations.
With Covid decimating his market, Juan now sells seed to other farmers.
“We have tried to keep the farming tradition alive,” says Juan, “not let it go. Because the land provides for us. It’s a lot and it’s hard, but it continues to feed us.”
This year, the family’s normal means of income, selling the sweets they make from amaranth, has been a bust. With no festivals to attend and fewer buyers on the street, they have sold next to nothing despite their best efforts. Juan says that it’s actually been difficult for a few years since the city government required them to form a cooperative – D’Alva Productos de Amaranto – and register with the tax authority.
Juan was told that the requirement was obligatory if they wanted to sell in any of the citywide festivals. But it meant that they had to begin paying taxes and accountants even before they received the support that the government promises the incorporating cooperatives – and the money, the equivalent of US $750–$1,000 won’t arrive for at least a year and a half. This year, most of their golden-brown amaranth, considered a superfood by the health food industry, has been sold as seed instead of being made into the bars and sweets that they usually produce.
Alegrías are the most ubiquitous form of amaranth that you will find in Mexico. These dense bars of puffed amaranth seeds are held together with honey and topped with peanuts and raisins; Juan and Alva add an extra touch by using cranberries instead. You can find these traditional sweets in every market and at every Metro stop in the city. They’re a filling and nutritious snack that has probably been around in some form or another for over 500 years.
Juan and Alva try to impress upon their customers that the secret to their alegrías is the artisanal production. Everything, from the planting of the seeds to the production of sweets in their home workshop, is done by hand. The workshop now sits spotlessly clean and organized, waiting for the day when they will be back to mass-producing.
The taste of their alegría bars is nuttier and fresher than any other I’ve had in Mexico, and the slightly higher price — about a dollar in comparison to the sometimes 10 cents for which you can find them on the street — reflects the quality of their ingredients.
“The land doesn’t stop. The animals need to be fed,” says Ángel Galicia, who sold specialty meats and vegetables to local restaurants that closed for months.
“I had a consumer that wanted me to sell him alegría at the price you buy in the Metro, about 3 pesos,” says Alva. “So I said, OK, bring me one of those bars. When I crushed the bars, I separated about 70% of it out and said, this part in those Metro bars is mostly Styrofoam. This 20% is garbage and rat poop. And the rest of it, might be real amaranth.”
Everyone gags a little at the idea of eating Styrofoam and rat poop, and I silently vow never to buy a bar of alegría in the Metro again.
“I don’t even like to make them weeks in advance,” says Juan about the various obleas, alegrías and a date and amaranth candy they invented called angelitos. “They don’t go bad, but I don’t like to do it that way. I want whoever eats this to be eating something fresh. That they enjoy it and say ‘Wow!’
“You just won’t find that anywhere else, only here. You will find the competition but not the same flavor. You carry the flavor with you.”
One-on-one conversations and tastings have been Juan and Alva’s biggest promotional opportunities during their five years of business. With Covid-19 essentially canceling the year, this face-to-face exchange has been impossible. They were recently invited to sell at a two-weekend Christmas tree fair, but the second weekend was canceled by the government because of a rise in cases.
Their situation is not an isolated one for farmers in the Valley of México during the pandemic. Ángel and Ernesto Galicia in Xochimilco farm one of the canals’ manmade islands. While they were at least able to receive a small sum from the government during the pandemic, it hasn’t been enough to meet their needs.
Amaranth treats Juan and Alva Rocha used to make to sell at festivals.
“We have to keep farming, though,” says Angel, “The land doesn’t stop. The animals need to be fed.”
The Galicias, who were previously producing mostly specialty vegetables for the local restaurant market, have now expanded their crops to include the produce that they as a family eat on a regular basis, things like Roma tomatoes, cilantro and chiles.
Many farmers in this area have suffered from reduced demand in Mexico’s largest commercial markets like the Central de Abastos, which shut down for the first time in 40 years during the pandemic. Smaller markets in the center of the city have also been shut down, albeit for short periods of time, because of Covid, and overall sales have been drastically reduced for everyone along the supply chain.
Juan recently sold the bulk of his amaranth seed to folks from the state of Michoacán who came to the city to buy it for their own land. They were also able to sell about 40 crates of tomatoes from this year’s crop out of the back of their pick-up by driving around the neighborhood.
Just like the Galicias, Juan and Alva have animals to feed and water — the horse, a dozen or so sheep, a handful of turkeys, geese and chickens and a mule. They slowly started to eat the turkeys and sheep once they were unable to sell them for meat, but all these animals take maintenance and water, another resource in short supply during this dry season, when water in Santa Cruz Acalpixca can be turned off for up to three weeks at a time.
All these factors have come to a head to make 2020 particularly difficult for this family. Their plot of land helps to keep them alive, and their business offers a tiny trickle of income, but like everyone else, they are holding their breath and hoping the Covid storm will pass with the coming of the new year.
“Until the pandemic ends, it’s going to be very difficult and we are going to have to adjust,” Juan says. “We are waiting for 2021, and then we will see.”
