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Confined to the Palacio de la Alvorada since he tested positive for covid-19 last week, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is in good health and firm in his strategy to defend the use of hydroxychloroquine and throw balls away.

"The future will tell whether this drug is effective or not. For me it was ... History will tell who was right in the future and who is responsible for the deaths," he said in a video broadcast on Wednesday. their social networks.

Since assuring that he was infected, Bolsonaro has used his contagion to exemplify that the disease is not as serious as it is painted and that the governors and mayors who imposed the restrictions that are causing serious damage to the economy actually had an alternative.

In this parallel narrative, contagion on his own skin plays a key role. "It may be a coincidence or it may not ... We know there is no scientific proof, but it worked for me," Bolsonaro said over and over. "Many doctors say that it works. I am not campaigning for the drug ... After all, it is very cheap, perhaps that is why there are many people against it, and others it seems to be due to ideological reasons. It seems, ok?" he insisted.

Bolsonaro reiterated that he began to feel well the day after taking the first hydroxychloroquine tablet. In more than a week he has hardly had any symptoms, beyond a slight fever at first, tiredness and muscle aches. Now he is waiting for a third test that confirms if he is already cured and can resume his usual schedule. None of the ministers with whom he had contact in previous days has tested positive. Not even his wife, Michelle Bolsonaro.

The military and the 'genocide'

Meanwhile, criticism of the government's management continues. The last to raise his voice was one of the Supreme Court justices, Gilmar Mendes. "The Army is associating itself with this genocide, it is not reasonable," he said, criticizing that the military have 'occupied' the Ministry of Health, which could end up being fatal to the image of the Armed Forces, according to what he said.

The Ministry of Health has been occupied on an interim basis since May by a military man with no health experience, Eduardo Pazuello, who has placed key positions in more than a dozen soldiers. With hardly any press conferences or interviews, under his management, the ministry went on to recommend in technical notes the use of hydroxychloroquine even for mild covid-19 patients.

None of the predecessors in office, doctors Luiz Henrique Mandetta and Nelson Teich, agreed to consider this medicine as an option to fight the pandemic, as Bolsonaro constantly demanded. For this and other reasons they ended up leaving the Government.

The harsh words of the Supreme Court judge against the military provoked the umpteenth crisis between the executive and judicial powers and added tension in a Brazil that already seems to have become accustomed to living with the tragedy. Most cities resume activity (which never completely stopped) when there are still hundreds of deaths and thousands of infections every day.

In the states most affected at the start of the pandemic, such as São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Amazonas, the numbers are starting to drop, but in 11 other states, especially in the central-western and southern parts of the country, the curve remains strong. ascending rhythm. Last week, the average number of deaths per day was 1,067. It was the seven deadliest days since the start of the pandemic. The combination of a two-speed Brazil makes the country show a stabilization, the famous 'plateau', on the charts, but at the moment there are no signs of falling.

Brazil already has more than 75,000 deaths and this Thursday it will possibly reach two million confirmed cases of covid-19, being the second most affected country in the world, only behind the United States.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

Know more

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  • Jair Bolsonaro

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