Colombia Minsalud Health Ministry Website Collapses Under Coronavirus Traffic

As Coronavirus arrives in Colombia, the website of Minsalud, Colombia’s ministry of health and social protection has gone offline intermittently and become unstable. The country is responding to the COVID-19 pandemic with a free app for Android mobile devices and telephone information lines.

The Colombian government is offering the free “CoronApp Colombia” for download on Android devices, and toll free information lines (within Colombia): 01-800 095-5590 or for Bogotá: 330 5041. International callers may dial +57 1 330-5041. The app is not available for Apple devices.

Meanwhile, the ministry’s website isn’t up to the task. The site in the past two days has been either completely inaccessible, returns 404 “page not found” errors (even on the home page), partially loads, or demands a user name and password.

As the World Health Organization today officially declared the COVID-19 Coronavirus outbreak a pandemic, now is not an opportune time for the health ministry’s website to crash. Frustrated users are encouraged to call the numbers above for more information or to check with legitimate news sources for more information.

BELOW: The health ministry website only partially loads. ABOVE: Often the page doesn’t load at all.