COVID-19 pandemic in Bolivia

The COVID-19 pandemic was confirmed to have spread to Bolivia when its first two cases were confirmed on 10 March 2020. They were in the departments of Oruro and Santa Cruz.^[1][2]

COVID-19 pandemic in Bolivia
Map of the outbreak in Bolivia by department (as of 13 May 2020[update])   600+ confirmed cases   300–599 confirmed cases   150–299 confirmed cases   50–149 confirmed cases   1–49 confirmed cases
Disease	COVID-19
Virus strain	SARS-CoV-2
Location	Bolivia
First outbreak	Spain, United States
Index case	Oruro and Santa Cruz
Arrival date	10 March 2020 (5 years, 4 months and 20 days)
Confirmed cases	3,148
Suspected cases‡	70
Recovered	338
Deaths	142
‡Suspected cases have not been confirmed by laboratory tests as being due to this strain, although some other strains may have been ruled out.

On 12 March, Bolivia ended all public school sessions until 31 March, as well as all commercial flights to and from Europe for a long time. They also prohibited large-scale public gatherings of more than 1,000 people.^[3]

Following the announcement of the first confirmed case, incidents were reported among the local population, including panic buying of surgical masks^[4][5] and hand sanitizer and blocking access to hospitals.^[6]

On 19 March a patient under observation who was required to stay in isolation tried to escape but was caught when he tried to take a trip between departments.^[7]