Responses to COVID-19 in five Latin American countries.

Background: COVID-19 reached Latin-American countries slightly later than European countries, around February/March, allowing some emergency preparedness response in countries characterized by low health system capacities and socioeconomic disparities.

Objective: This paper focuses on the first months of the pandemic in five Latin American countries: Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru. It analyses how the pre-pandemic context, and the government's responses to contain and mitigate the spread together with economic measures have affected the COVID-19 health outcomes.