Past peak? Chile raises hopes vaccines, lockdowns are turning tide against COVID-19

Chile's health authorities said on Thursday they believed a dip in the record case numbers the Andean nation has seen over the past week represents a 'stabilization' of a second COVID-19 wave thanks to strict lockdowns and a rapid vaccination program that has fully innoculated a third of the population. Health minister Enrique Paris told reporters he hoped the 9,000 record daily cases reached last week represented the peak of the latest outbreak. 'Once we reach that peak, we expect not a reduction but a stabilization and then a return to smaller numbers of positive patients,' he said.