Brazil has third highest rate of coronavirus infections
BRAZIL,(DAILY MAIL),19 MAY 2020 - Brazil has the third-highest number of novel coronavirus cases in the world, according to official figures released yesterday.
With 254,220 confirmed cases, Brazil has now surpassed Britain, Spain and Italy in the past 72 hours on the list of total infections, and is behind only the United States (1.5 million) and Russia (290,000).
Brazil has registered 16,792 COVID-19 deaths, the sixthhighest toll in the world.
Last month, experts at two of the country’s leading universities said under-testing could mean the real figures were 15 times higher or more than those recorded by the Ministry of Health.
The giant South American country of 210 million people is torn by a political battle over how to respond to the virus.
Far-right President Jair Bolsonaro compares the virus to a ‘little flu,’ condemns the ‘hysteria’ surrounding it and is urging the country to get back to work to stop an economic crash.
State and local authorities, however, are largely calling on citizens to stay home and practice social distancing - backed by the Supreme Court, which gave them the final say in the matter.
The pandemic has meanwhile added to concerns about indigenous groups in the Amazon, since they have a tragic history of being decimated by diseases arriving from the outside world.
The virus has now infected 40 indigenous groups, with 537 positive cases and 102 deaths, according to the Brazilian Indigenous Peoples’ Association.
Brazil has an estimated 800,000 indigenous people from 300 ethnic groups.