Winter, reopenings will keep Brazilians on edge

NEWDELHI: TWO days after Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro tested positive for Covid-19, he yet again called for the states to be reopened.

But many people across the Brazilian heartland suspect the reopenings, amid the onset of the winter, could further fan the spread of the deadly respiratory disease.

A lot of people in the country believe the government should be heeding the WHO’S warnings instead of rushing to lift restrictions.

Leticia Kawano Dourado, a respiratory physician at Sao Paulo’s Hospital do Coracao, is one of them. “There’s a false dichotomy between the economy and health,” Dourado told HT. “Many cities have now reopened without fulfilling WHO criteria.”

Brazil has reported at least 1.8mn Covid-19 cases and over 70,300 deaths. Sao Paulo is among the badly hit places.

Apart from the spectre of hurried reopenings, the winter has health officials and the public worried. Winter “fuels respiratory infections - like seasonal influenza and pneumonia - that can rapidly spread in colder climates,” warned WHO Americas director Carissa Etienne.

“Winter is a cause for concern because people spend more time in closed spaces. Plus, the cold weather also brings other viruses,” Elnara Marcia Negri, a pulmonologist at Hospital Sirio-libanes in Sao Paulo, told this daily.

The focus is now on the capital Brasilia, which is seeing an explosion of cases. It has more cases per capita than any other major city in the country.

“They’re reopening everything without a clear plan, saying that getting sick is inevitable,” rues Brasilia resident Ana Lustosa da Costa. With two of her nephews testing positive, she is now worried about her parents.