President Sebastián Piñera politely asked the novel coronavirus to “leave the country”.

While visiting Chile’s northernmost region, the head of State shocked many with his curious request.

Mr Piñera was discussing the redistribution of public funds in light of the pandemic when he made his remarks.

“Priorities change and they did because of an invisible and microscopic, but lethal and very destructive virus called coronavirus. I ask the virus, as president of Chile, to leave us alone and to leave the country”, he said.

This morning, the Government reported 2,033 new Covid-19 cases, bringing the total of diagnosed patients to 408,009 since March, when the pandemic took hold.

This afternoon, the Ministry of Health’s Statistics Unit informed 15,505 deaths due to SARS-CoV-2.