The Covid-19 pandemic shows that those who corrupt the truth and falsify reality must be stopped, because they endanger the survival of the population. No global case is more notorious than that of Jair Bolsonaro, the antidemocrat who rules Brazil. He has already horrified part of humanity with his racist statements and the destruction of the Amazon. On Sunday, he showed that he is insane by breaking the quarantine, putting Brazilians at risk and not respecting the protection rules established by his own Ministry of Health. Bolsonaro united coup, denial and threat to life in a single act.
Notorious climate denialist, Bolsonaro called the pandemic a "fantasy" of the media during a visit to his idol Donald Trump. Being in quarantine for having had contact with 14 people who tested positive, the far-right man made a Facebook transmission with a mask. He called on the right-wing extremists who support him to suspend the demonstration against Congress and the Federal Supreme Court scheduled for last Sunday due to the pandemic. Before, Bolsonaro had stimulated and spread the protest. Most believed that they had finally had an unexpected encounter with reality and understood that the epidemic is real. Nothing. On Sunday, Bolsonaro attended the demonstration, in an explicit act of coup, and violated the rules of his own health minister by stimulating the agglomeration of people in a pandemic, taking selfies , manipulating followers' phones and shaking hands.
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In addition to confronting the democratic powers, he put his own population at risk and gave the worst example that a head of state could give at this very serious moment. And more: he called "extremism" and "hysteria" the measures taken by his own government to control the virus. "This virus is not all they say," he continued to insist on Monday.
Brazil has discovered, in the midst of a pandemic, that it not only has a coup leader in power, but also a maniac. And now that? The reaction of institutions and society to the threat posed by the elected despot will determine the immediate future of the country. However, in a globalized world, this problem is not only in Brazil. It is a problem of the planet. The same criminal irresponsibility that is ending the Amazon now puts global control of the pandemic at risk.
The Covid-19 has shown the level of perversion that denialists can achieve to maintain their project of power. Those who denied the risk of the pandemic are the same ones who deny the climate crisis. The virus will likely pass, leaving a trail of death. The climate catastrophe is only beginning.
Translation by Meritxell Almarza.
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