Bolsonaro threatens WHO exit as COVID-19 kills ‘a Brazilian per minute’
President Jair Bolsonaro threatened on Friday to pull Brazil out of the World Health Organisation (WHO) after the UN agency warned governments about the risk of lifting lockdowns before slowing the spread of the novel coronavirus.
A new Brazilian record for daily COVID-19 fatalities pushed Brazil’s death toll past that of Italy late on Thursday, but Mr Bolsonaro continues to argue for quickly lifting state isolation orders, arguing that their economic costs outweigh public health risks.
In an editorial running the length of newspaper Folha de S.Paulo’s front page, the Brazilian daily highlighted that just 100 days had passed since Bolsonaro described the virus now “killing a Brazilian per minute” as “a little flu”.
“While you were reading this, another Brazilian died from the coronavirus,” the newspaper said.
Brazil’s Health Ministry reported late on Thursday that confirmed cases in the country had climbed past 646,000 and 1437 deaths had been registered within 24 hours.
With more than 35,000 lives lost, the pandemic has killed more people in Brazil than anywhere outside of the United States and United Kingdom. Asked about efforts to loosen social distancing orders in Brazil despite rising daily death rates and diagnoses, WHO spokesperson Margaret Harris said a key criteria for lifting lockdowns was slowing transmission.
“The epidemic, the outbreak, in Latin America is deeply, deeply concerning,” she told a news conference in Geneva. She said among six key criteria for easing quarantines, “one of them is ideally having your transmission declining.”
In comments to journalists later on Friday, Mr Bolsonaro said Brazil would consider leaving the WHO unless it ceases to be a “partisan political organisation”.