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After Brazil set two consecutive records in the number of deaths from covid-19 this week, Foreign Minister Ernesto Araújo normalized the situation of the pandemic in the country today. According to him, the increase in contagion cases and deaths after the start of mass vaccination is “normal”, but he did not cite studies to support his claim.
As for the number of cases and deaths, it is very tragic, but apparently it is normal after the start of a massive vaccination, the cases increase in the countries and then fall sharply ”.
Ernesto Araújo, Minister of Foreign Affairs
The statement was made this Friday during a conference on relations between Brazil and the United States, at the event “Brazil-United States Relations: A Conversation with Ernesto Araújo” (Brazil-United States Relations: A Conversation with Ernesto Araújo) promoted by the “Council of the Americas.” The Brazilian ambassador in Washington, Nestor Forster, was also present at the event, whose audience is mainly composed of American businessmen.
Experts warn, however, that there is not yet enough data on vaccinated to observe the impact on the contaminated and dead curves. The only country to present preliminary data so far was Israel, which saw a drop in pollution and hospitalizations among the elderly. Even countries like the United States and the United Kingdom still do not have sufficient data for analysis due to the low number of people vaccinated until then.
The minister added that it is possible that in two or three weeks Brazil will see its case curve fall similar to the other countries that are applying vaccines. The speech, however, goes against what has been warning doctors and researchers. The forecast is that Brazil will have the worst month in deaths since the beginning of the pandemic.
The foreign minister acknowledged that the speed of vaccination in Brazil has been slower than necessary and compared the rate of local immunization with that of other countries in an attempt to show that the Brazilian situation is not bad.
“Vaccination is picking up speed. Of course we would like it to be faster. It is slow compared to the United States, but if you compare it to Europe it is not that slow. European countries already have a little over 5% of the population. vaccinated In Brazil we have around 4%.
Brazil has so far vaccinated 3.62% of the population with a single dose of the Oxford and CoronaVac vaccines. In Europe, the percentage has varied from 3% to 12% of those vaccinated with the first dose depending on the country.
Like Brazil, Europe has drawn attention to the slowness of vaccination and leaders have weighed in on the promise of having 70% of the population immunized by late summer in the northern hemisphere.
In the minister’s assessment, the Brazilian health system has resisted the pressure of demand. “The health system is overloaded, but it is holding up well. There are some problems in some states, but overall the system is holding up well.”
After the north of the country saw a collapse in its healthcare system, now the south and some northeastern states are also heading towards the same destination. In the southeast, São Paulo and Minas Gerais have already expressed the risk of also seeing their systems full.
In line with what President Jair Bolsonaro (without a party) has said, Araújo has been against the blockade in the country. “People want to get vaccinated, but they also want to work. There is strong popular pressure not to have a shutdown or to end the shutdowns that have already been imposed by some states.”
Climate problem
The foreign minister celebrated the relations between Brazil and the United States throughout the event, although he avoided talking about the rupture of his foreign policy strategy after Joe Biden came to power.
He went on to say that the Bolsonaro government was responsible for uniting the two countries and rejected criticism that Brazil has not benefited from the agreements reached during the Donald Trump administration.
Today, the greatest concern of experts and diplomats about Brazilian foreign policy is the environment. Araújo said that both countries are aligned on this issue and cited the meeting he held with the Minister of the Environment, Ricardo Salles, with the United States special envoy for the climate, John Kerry.
“We will be together in everything with the Biden administration,” he said. “We are absolutely together on the climate issue, that is important to say. The conversations that Minister Salles and I had with John Kerry showed that we can work as central partners to fully implement the instruments of the climate agreements.”
They were concerned that this could be an impediment to the continuation of this alliance, it got out of the way, we are totally together on this issue.
Ernesto Araújo
“In general, the willingness to cooperate on the issue of deforestation, for example, is completely on the table. The provision for significant investments in sustainable development in the Amazon seems to be fully on the table.”
During the week of the meeting, the Twitter Jamil Chad revealed that the encounter was not viewed with the same positivity by Americans. Technicians in the Biden administration took precautions and were not convinced by Brazil’s version that the Bolsonaro government is efficiently dealing with deforestation in the country.
Asked about a possible bilateral meeting between President Jair Bolsonaro and Joe Biden, Araújo limited himself to saying that he has “great hopes” for this to happen and even joked with the names of both: “they have the same initials, JB.”
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