Eyes on Costa Rica and Weather Records - May 2022 / Covid-19 Update

 During May, visits to this blog were received from the following 7 countries:

The total number of countries and non-independent jurisdictions from which visits have been received remains at 134. Of this number, 13 are non-independent jurisdictions such as the Isle of Man, Hong Kong, Puerto Rico, etc. Seven countries are less than average.

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May is the first full month that we were settled in San Roque de Grecia. Here is a summary of the weather for the month and a summary from the day we arrived until month end:

Compared to May 2021 when we lived in Hacienda El Paseo (a short distance southwest of Grecia), the average overnight low temperature in San Roque was about 1.5°F (0.83°C) lower. Somewhat surprisingly and despite being at a significantly higher altitude the average daytime high in San Roque was virtually the same as last year in Hacienda El Paseo.

Rainfall comparisons are a different matter. For us, 25.51 inches (648 mm) in a single month is a record for any month of any year in any place where we have lived and kept records in Costa Rica (firstly Vista Atenas; secondly Hacienda El Paseo; and now San Roque). Also, we have never before encountered 28 days of rain in a single month.

The nice thing about the rain is that on any given day it is often preceded by mornings with light or broken clouds and usually does not begin until early afternoon. Often, it only lasts for 2 or 3 hours or less. This serves to keep everything green and fresh. Thus, we have the so-called green season in Costa Rica.

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Covid-19 Update

The following table updates information which appeared in my blog entry posted on May 6, 2022:

Overall, the death rate in Costa Rica is down 0.05% since my last post. That in the United States is down 0.03% and that in Canada is up 0.01%

If you want to see how some other country is doing in comparison to Costa Rica, then visit the website of Worldometer. Numbers for populations, reported cases and reported deaths can be obtained from that site. All that is then needed is some simple math to calculate the percentage death rate for the other country and the death rate in that country compared to Costa Rica.

If you want more up to date information and statistics on the situation in Costa Rica, including various locales in Costa Rica, then the web site of the Costa Rican Ministry of Health ("Ministerio de Salud") is a good source. If you do not understand Spanish, then you should enable translation features on your web browser if they are available.

Click on images to enlarge.

Eyes on Costa Rica and Weather Records - March 2022 / Covid-19 Update

During March, visits to this blog were received from the following 11 countries:

The total number of countries and non-independent jurisdictions from which visits have been received remains at 134. Of this number, 13 are non-independent jurisdictions such as the Isle of Man, Hong Kong, Puerto Rico, etc.

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The following is a summary of weather for the month in the area where we live:

March 2022 had marginally warmer overnight lows and significantly warmer daytime highs than March 2021. The average low was 0.7 °F (0.4 °C) warmer. The average high was 2.6 °F (1.5 °C) warmer. The 3 days with measurable rainfall compares with none in March 2021.

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Covid-19 Update

The following table updates information which appeared in my blog entry posted on March 7, 2022:

Overall, the death rate in Costa Rica is down 0.01% since my last post on this topic. It is 0.04% in Canada and up 0.02% in the U.S.

If you want to see how some other country is doing in comparison to Costa Rica, then visit the website of Worldometer. Numbers for populations, reported cases and reported deaths can be obtained from that site. All that is then needed is some simple math to calculate the percentage death rate for the other country and the death rate in that country compared to Costa Rica.

If you want more up to date information and statistics on the situation in Costa Rica, including various locales in Costa Rica, then the web site of the Costa Rican Ministry of Health ("Ministerio de Salud") is a good source. If you do not understand Spanish, then you should enable translation features on your web browser if they are available.

Click on images to enlarge.

QR Codes, Boosters, and the Covid 19 Situation in Costa Rica

The Tico Times has a recent article on how to go about getting your QR code in Costa Rica. We have our QR codes and we had them printed onto plasticized cards about the size of a credit card, using this company in our town of Grecia:

It was so easy - we sent our information via e-mail to Imprenta Grecia and picked the cards up a few days later. Cost: C5,000 per card (about $10 CAD). With the card, it makes showing that one is fully vaccinated very easy. Then, if we go to a restaurant or any other place which requires proof of vaccination, all we have to do is flash our card and allow them to scan our cards.

We also received our booster shots last Friday. How did we know when and where we needed to go for these? Facebook! I belong to quite a few Costa Rican Facebook pages and these are invaluable sources of information. Members freely share information and this link for vaccination shots was posted. By looking for our town - Grecia (page 7) - we learned where the boosters would be given and at what times. Salón Parroquial is right across from the Catholic church.

People also shared the wait times they experienced and based on this we opted to wait until the second week before attempting to get the boosters. This proved to be a good idea as our wait outside the building was no more then ten minutes. Once we were inside, there were chairs to sit in. Everything was very well organized. Staff take your carné de vacunación (vaccination card) and eventually your name gets called.  I think we sat inside for no more then 45 minutes before receiving our boosters.

In my blog post on December 12 (and as I have done in some earlier posts), I provided a table of numbers from Worldometer with calculations comparing the evolving situation of Covid 19 in Costa Rica with that in Canada and the United States. However, unlike the earlier posts, I did not include any link to where one could go to obtain more comprehensive graphic information unique to Costa Rica. The link had been to a special web page of the La Nacion newspaper, but it appeared that the page was no longer being kept up to date.

It turns out that up to date graphic information the same as or similar to that previously provided by La Nacion can be obtained by going to the web site of the Costa Rican Ministry of Health ("Ministerio de Salud" in Spanish).

Another way to get graphic information not only for Costa Rica but also for many other countries is to Google the phrase "covid 19 graph". At present, a page headed "Coronavirus disease" should then appear. Under the sub-heading "Statistics", a chart showing the evolution of covid cases in a selected country should also appear. The selected country can be changed to any other country which may be desired. For example, the charts for Costa Rica, the United States and Canada are presently as follows:

The information provided by Canada is not as up to date as that provided by Costa Rica and the United States. Nevertheless, like the United States, the number of new cases in Canada appears to be surging whereas the number of new cases in Costa Rica has been steadily dropping towards zero. This may change if the Omicron variant of Covid-19 takes hold in Costa Rica as it has in the United States and Canada. On December 19, the Ministry of Health confirmed detection of the first case in Costa Rica (an 8 year old boy).

As reported by the Tico Times on December 20 the boy and his family had recently travelled to the United States.

Click on images to enlarge.