Introduction
In May 2020, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) declared the
region an epicenter of the disease (Pan American Organization, 2020) and
in November 2020, cumulative COVID-19 cases in Latin America accounted
for around 24% of all cases and 33% of all deaths globally. (World
Health Organization, n.d.)
Although PAHO (Pan American Health Organization, 2020) and other
organizations (World Health Organization, 2020a)(2019-nCoV Working Group.
Communicable Diseases Network Australia., 2020) have released laboratory
guidance for diagnosing COVID-19 cases, few have considered the
availability of tests when making these recommendations. Latin America
is a region with great socio-economic contrasts (World Bank Development
Indicators DataBank, n.d.), as well as unequal health resources and, like
in developed countries (Pablos-Méndez et al., 2020), the availability of
COVID-19 tests and trained personnel are not exempt from supply chain or
personnel pressures.
A panel of Latin American experts gathered to discuss the best use of
diagnostic methods in the region and propose a simplified algorithm.