There was once a Brazil powerful, the “South American giant”. The “Brazilian joy” was the social mark of a diverse and extraordinary culture. A thriving economy that came to form the BRIC –Brazil, Russia, India and China-, the five emerging economies that at the beginning of the 2000s were the most promising in the world.
Once Upon a time. Because it is no longer. Today joy is pain. If something marks Brazil at the moment, it is the daily death count and becoming a global focus of the coronavirus pandemic. And an economic and political collapse of a messianic leader, yesterday almighty and now aimless and possibly without a future.
Not only are there no tanned bodies on the beaches of Rio de Janeiro, there are no longer beds in hospitals to die from Covid-19. There are no longer risk groups, the old and the young die.
The number of fatalities is increasing among young people, perhaps due to the local variant of the virus that has begun to spread to other parts of the world.
In March, some 2,800 people under 40 years of age died from the coronavirus in Brazil, almost three times the number in January.
In one year, the country exceeded 300,000 deaths. At a rate of 3,000 deaths a day in the last week. And the prospects are dramatic.
Brazil is a health risk for the region and for the world.
“The worst pandemic is populism,” Mauricio Macri said some time ago. Many Brazilians – even those who voted for him – believe today that the worst pandemic is Jair Bolsonaro.
The worst pandemic is populism
The coronavirus found in Bolsonaro an ideal partner to expand and create more lethal variants in Brazil. Denialist – “he’s a little flu”, he said, brabucón – “wearing a chinstrap is for fagots”, he maintained – delirious and provocative, he believed himself to be all-powerful.
Today almost nothing remains of that Bolsonaro. The “flu” is wearing it and is living through its most difficult days since he assumed the presidency, haunted by several fronts. Even the shots come from the Allied front.
And the word most feared by Brazilian presidents has already started to sound: “impeachment”. The head of the Chamber of Deputies, Bolsonarista Arthur Lira, has just publicly warned that the Legislature has ready a “bitter remedy” against government incompetence.
The remedy is impeachment, which in Brazil dispatched two presidents in three decades, Fernando Collor de Mello and Dilma Rousseff.
The warning of the pro-government legislators goes hand in hand with polls that mark a record level of rejection of the management. Datafolha’s latest work showed that the president maintains the worst level of adherence since he took office in 2019, with only 30% approving.
The danger for Bolsonaro increases because the financial world, influential businessmen and bankers are already openly demanding urgent measures to contain the pandemic and that they go against what the former captain is preaching. Many of these businessmen signed an open letter last week in which they described the current scenario as “bleak.”
It is not enough today that the dangerous Manaus strain has led the president and his followers to wear chinstraps and promote vaccines, in addition to changing General Eduardo Pazuello for cardiologist Marcelo Queiroga at the head of the Ministry of Health.
Bolsonaro is becoming a political pariah. Last Tuesday he gave a speech to the nation in solidarity with those who lost a relative due to the coronavirus. The response was thunderous cacerolazos in the main cities of the country.
Until the world economic debacle, Brazil was Argentina’s main trading partner. Everything that happens with their economy impacts ours. “If Brazil sneezes, Argentina catches a cold”, they say. So linked are our economies. That is why the fall of the continental giant affects us.
And now the pandemic has joined. That it is not a simple cold. Ezeiza is already closed to flights from Brazil.
But the collapse of the health system affects the borders and the three southern states bordering the provinces of Misiones and Corrientes, Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina and Paraná suffer. Places where it is practically impossible to stop the passage of people.
But the earthquake that Bolsonaro’s Brazil is experiencing is affected by the reappearance of a central protagonist in Brazilian political life in recent decades.
Lula’s return to the electoral arena changes the terms of the political confrontations. Even some right-wing politicians are beginning to consider Lula as a less bad option, compared to Bolsonaro of course.
The latest polls show Lula ahead of the former captain heading into next year’s presidential elections. The possible return of the PT to power in Brazil means a turn of the screw in regional politics with very strong consequences.
All of the above affects Argentina. In health, economics and politics. Our gigantic neighbor is reeling. It is not at all convenient to take your eyes off him
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