Unidentified bodies pile up in crisis-torn Latin America
Bodies are being piled up across Manaus in northern Brazil, with the city brought to its knees by Covid-19.
The local health system collapsed over two weeks ago, while gravediggers have resorted to burying the dead in mass graves.
A shortage of cemetery staff forced one family to bury their father themselves after a three-day hunt for his body in heaps of corpses.
‘‘There were lots of bodies on top of each other, without any identification,’’ one man told the local press.
Brazil is fast becoming Latin America’s new crisis centre, as the daily death toll begins to outstrip some of the worst-affected countries in Europe.
Ecuador hit the headlines in April as the virus spread uncontrolled and bodies were left to rot in the streets, and many fear Brazil is on a similar path.
Jair Bolsonaro, the far-Right Brazilian president, has taken a laissezfaire approach, and has been dismissive of the crisis.
In a press briefing last Tuesday, when asked about the 474 deaths that day, he replied: ‘‘So what?’’
‘‘I’m sorry. What do you want me to do?’’ Bolsonaro added.
Brazil recorded 400-500 new deaths each day last week, but an Imperial College London study estimated the true number of cases could be 1 million.
While Brazil is grappling with rising numbers, some of the most harrowing scenes have played out in Ecuador.
Families dumped their dead in the street, with coffins piled up by the hundreds in saturated morgues, reports claim.
The government has reported 29,538 cases and 1564 deaths, but Lenin Moreno, the Ecuadorean president, has said the official number is ‘‘coming up short’’ and has called for transparency. At the end of April, Covid-19-related deaths began to drop and the government planned to loosen the lockdown. The decision will be reversed if infections pick up again.
– Telegraph Group