Rio de Janeiro (AFP)

With the milestone of 30,000 dead in Brazil, the coronavirus continues its meteoric progression in Latin America while Italy, one of the most affected European countries but where the epidemic is stalling, reopens its borders on Wednesday.

The Latin American giant of 212 million inhabitants Tuesday recorded a daily record of deaths due to the virus, bringing to 31,199 the number of deaths, for 555,383 confirmed patients of Covid-19, according to the Ministry of Health.

These figures, which the scientific community considers grossly undervalued, place Brazil in 4th place in the world for the dead, behind the United States - which remains by far the country hardest hit with 106,180 dead - the United Kingdom ( 39.369) and Italy (33.530).

In total, the Covid-19 pandemic has killed at least 379,585 people on the planet since its appearance in December in China, according to a report established by AFP from official sources.

The main Brazilian households are the State of Sao Paulo, the country's economic and cultural engine, and that of Rio de Janeiro, a major tourist center. Both have started a deconfinement, worrying some scientists: "In the current situation, any loosening of containment measures amounts to spraying gasoline on the fire," warned Rafael Galliez, infectious disease specialist at the Federal University of Rio (UFRJ ).

Brazil, whose president Jair Bolsonaro regularly calls for the lifting of restrictions to preserve the economy and jobs, accounts for more than half of the cases of contamination and deaths of Covid-19 in Latin America.

The virus continues to spread there at high speed: Colombia, bordering Brazil, has exceeded 1,000 deaths less than three months after the detection of the first case of contagion; Mexico, which is also starting to resume its economic activity, has more than 10,000 and Peru deplores more than 4,600.

In Bolivia, more than 10,500 cases of Covid-19 and more than 300 deaths have been recorded, figures increasing sharply. In this country, the authorities of the cities of La Paz and El Alto will mark the houses of the sick who refuse to confine themselves with signs, in the face of numerous violations of sanitary measures by contaminated people.

In Venezuela, Covid-19 unleashed an unexpected rapprochement between two sworn enemies: Socialist President Nicolas Maduro and opponent Juan Guaido, who have reached an agreement to jointly seek funds against the disease.

- "Air bridges" -

The near-normalization continues in Europe, where the French were able to drink their coffee on the terrace on Tuesday and where tourist highlights such as the Guggenheim museum in Bilbao (Spain), the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul or the Colosseum in Rome have cautiously reopened.

In the hope of saving its tourist industry undermined by the health crisis, Italy - including one of the regions, Lombardy (north), was the epicenter of the epidemic on the Old Continent - reopens its borders on Wednesday to European tourists.

If Italians will also be able to move freely between regions, the prohibitions on large gatherings and the obligation to wear a mask in enclosed spaces and on public transport remain in force.

The epidemic crisis "is not over," warned the President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella.

With nearly 33,000 deaths, Italy is the second most bereaved country in Europe, behind the United Kingdom.

The British government plans to establish air bridges with some weakly affected countries, which would avoid many travelers entering the United Kingdom from observing the quarantine, feared by tourism professionals.

For its part, Latvia on Wednesday lifts the quarantine requirement for travelers from more than twenty European countries, a measure already adopted by neighboring Estonia and Lithuania. And Germany, the largest European economy, must decide on the same day on the lifting of the warnings on tourist travel in the European Union, put in place to fight against the coronavirus.

burx-phy / am / roc

© 2020 AFP