The Economist USA - 28.03.2020

The EconomistMarch 28th 2020 29

1

T

he firstperson to die from covid-19 in
the state of Rio de Janeiro was a 63-year-
old maid who commuted each week to a
beachside apartment in Leblon, the prici-
est neighbourhood in Brazil. Her employer
had recently returned from Italy. The maid,
who had diabetes and high blood pressure,
died on March 17th in a city 100km (60
miles) away, where she and five relatives
shared a cinder-block house. Several hos-
pital workers there have since fallen ill. 
If the virus in Italy jumps between gen-
erations living together, in Brazil it started
by hopping between classes, which are so-
cially distant but physically close. One vec-
tor may be the populist president, Jair Bol-
sonaro. On March 15th, after his
communications secretary tested positive
for the virus, he ignored quarantine orders
and took selfies with fans. When the first
Brazilian died of covid-19 on the next day,
he denounced “hysteria” about the virus.
Other leaders are less complacent. Vot-
ing remotely for the first time, congress-
men proclaimed a “state of calamity”,

which lets the government breach consti-

tutional spending limits. Rodrigo Maia, the

president of the lower house, wants to

spend at least 400bn reais ($80bn, or 4% of

gdp) to help the health system and the

economy. The health minister, Luiz Hen-

rique Mandetta, is not an ideologue, unlike

many of his cabinet colleagues. City and

state governments are imposing isolation

measures—São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro

have full lockdowns—and turning football

stadiums into hospitals. Universities and

private labs are developing covid-19 tests.

Companies are donating materials for their

production. Brazil’s biggest brewery is

making hand sanitiser. 

But workers against the disease must

block out signals from a president who

continues to disparage their efforts. On

March 25th he told Mr Mandetta to stop

calling for large-scale social distancing. In

a televised speech on March 24th, he urged

local governments to abandon “scorched-

earth” strategies of closing schools and

shops, and blasted the media for spreading

“the sensation of fear”.

As The Economistwent to press, Brazil

had 59 covid-19 deaths and 2,554 confirmed

cases. But testing has mostly been limited

to patients in hospital. The true number is

probably much higher. Piecemeal respons-

es by governments and the private sector

will not fend off disaster. Warm climates

like Brazil’s may slow transmission of the

virus, says a new study from the Massachu-

setts Institute of Technology. Otherwise

“there are no mitigating factors,” says Pau-

lo Chapchap of the Sírio-Libanês hospital

in São Paulo. Private hospitals like his are

strained, because current patients tend to

be rich folk who caught the disease abroad,

or their intimates. As it migrates to the

masses it could quickly overwhelm the

public health system, which serves four-

fifths of the population.

Brazil’s universal health-care system

serves more people than any other totally

free system in the world, but the country

spends just 3.8% of gdpon it. Italy spends

6.7% of gdp; Germany, 9.4%. Brazil’s public

system has just seven acute-care hospital

beds per 100,000 people, nearly all of

which are occupied by non-covid patients.

Demand for acute-care beds in some cities

Covid-19 in Brazil

BolsoNero

SÃO PAULO
Brazil’s president fiddles as a pandemic looms

The Americas

30 The Mexican-American border closes

32 Bello: The Latin American patient

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