The Brazilian president threatened to withdraw his country from the World Health Organization on Friday. "Either the WHO works without ideological bias, or we are leaving it too," he said. 

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro threatened Friday to withdraw his country from the World Health Organization (WHO), along with his American counterpart Donald Trump, to protest against his "ideological bias".

"I tell you here, the United States left WHO, we are considering it in the future (...). Either WHO works without ideological bias, or we are leaving it too. "We don't need outsiders to give their feelings about health here," he told reporters in Brasilia.

"Chloroquine is back"

Throughout the coronavirus crisis, Jai Bolsonaro imitated Donald Trump by minimizing the severity of the disease, urging him to maintain normal activity, and praising the effectiveness of a treatment that divides scientists, hydroxychloroquine.

Speaking on the latter subject, the Brazilian president said he was not surprised that a study in the medical journal The Lancet, which concluded that the treatment was useless, was strongly questioned and then withdrawn. This withdrawal prompted the WHO to resume clinical trials on the molecule. "Trump took the money away from them and they went back on everything," said Jair Bolsonaro. "Chloroquine is back," he added.

More than 35,000 dead in Brazil

In its latest report published on Friday evening, the Brazilian Ministry of Health stopped giving the total number of deaths, which reached 35,026, to reveal only that of the last 24 hours (1,005). By Thursday, that total had become the third highest in the world, behind the United States and the United Kingdom, but ahead of Italy.

Brazil has recorded more than 645,000 cases, a number that many specialists consider largely undervalued, due to the lack of sufficient tests.