Coronavirus in Brazil: the scourges of the coronavirus in Manaus

The first Brazilian health system to collapse due to the pandemic was Manaus, in the Amazon state. That happened in April. Mayor Arthur Virgilio Neto says that “we are no longer in a state of emergency, but in absolute calamity.”

Manaus has the highest mortality rate in a city in Brazil due to coronaviruses: 12,599 infections and more than 1,000 deaths until last Friday. But the worst is yet to come, according to the city’s mayor, Arthur Virgilio Neto, who predicted that the infections could peak in mid-May. I mean, right now.

Manaus, located in the heart of the Brazilian Amazon, is the capital of the country’s largest state: Amazonas, as extensive as Mongolia. It has four million inhabitants, 185,000 of them indigenous, in 20 municipalities, of which 90% register cases of contagion.

See more: “We are facing a disaster”, mayor of Manaus

Manaus is another level: it was the first place where the health system collapsed and today the number of daily deaths is tripling. The daily average of deaths in that city of 2.1 million inhabitants went from 30 -before the pandemic- to a hundred. In April, 2,435 funerals were recorded, an average of 80 per day, more than three per hour. The city has only six funeral cars to serve the most vulnerable population.

In dialogue with this newspaper, Izabella, 24, a resident of Manaus, explained that “around 2 million people depend on hours (even days) of boat trips to access the health system.”

According to official data published in 2018, 47.6% of its population lives below the poverty line, with monthly income of approximately 420 reais, equivalent to US $ 77. 6.3% of its population, about 130,000 people, live in conditions of extreme poverty, with monthly income of 145 reais, equivalent to US $ 26. With its hospital system overwhelmed, an insufficient number of doctors, a dramatic scene of mass graves and a delayed response from Brasilia, Manaus is having a difficult time.

See more: Shock plan to treat the coronavirus in Amazonas

Something that aggravated the lack of commitment of citizens to isolation measures. According to Mayor Neto, “the most populous areas of the city have been the ones that have most disobeyed the rules of social isolation.” Partly, because from the central government, President Jair Bolsonaro has campaigned against quarantines, the only tool that so far seems to give the best results in places where it has been applied.

“If we listen to the president, we will have an absurd number of deaths. Fortunately, most of the governors and the Ministry of Health have remained firm in the face of Bolsonaro’s thoughtless statements, “said Izabella.

Amazonas is torn between an announced drought, typical of the months of May, June and July, deforestation that does not stop and COVID-19. An announced human and environmental tragedy, according to the words of the Manaus mayor himself: “It is a scene from a horror movie. We are no longer in a state of emergency, but in absolute calamity. “

Neighboring Tabatinga

Another Amazon region that is being hit hard is Tabatinga (Brazil), a neighbor of Leticia (Colombia). “Our border is too porous, there are many parts where you can pass (…) here it would be necessary to add the cases of Leticia (Colombia) and Tabatinga (Brazil), because they are twin cities,” Daniel Oliveira, departmental controller, told AFP.

Although Colombia closed its land borders on March 16 and opted for isolation, in Brazil, with more than 7,000 deaths and 100,000 infections, the policy is different. Of the first 10 cases detected in Leticia, five were imported from the neighboring country. “Getting sick here is always scary, but today we are more afraid than ever,” says the local Yohana Pantevis, 34.

See more: Colombia closed all its borders until May 30

In Colombia, ONIC reported four natives dead and 15 infected with the new coronavirus. The indigenous knower Antonio Bolívar, one of the protagonists of the acclaimed film The embrace of the serpent, died in Leticia at age 75 from COVID-19.

In that department “the growth of the coronavirus curve is very great,” said the governor of the Amazon, Jesús Galdino Cedeño, who added that because it is next to the Brazilian city of Tabatinga, “infections have grown exponentially.”