Amnesty International denounces that the pandemic exacerbates inequality and abuses in America

Field hospital in a gym in the Brazilian town of Santo André, in São Paulo.MIGUEL SCHINCARIOL / AFP

From north to south, America is home to 13% of the world's population, but has recorded almost half of the deaths from covid-19.

Part of the most affected population belongs to marginalized populations, who do not have the possibility of complying with the necessary prevention measures and who have seen their lives deteriorate even more since the spread of the coronavirus: last year, 22 new million people fell in poverty in this region.

Amnesty International denounces that the pandemic has hit the most unequal region on the planet with particular harshness, by aggravating these differences, and has been used by some leaders to intensify their attack on human rights.

"Women, refugees, migrants, insufficiently protected health personnel, indigenous peoples, black people and other historically forgotten groups have endured the worst effects of the pandemic," highlights Amnesty in its report

The situation of rights humans in the world

.

With more than 54 million cases and 1.3 million deaths, America has become the epicenter of the pandemic and today faces a second wave that threatens to be equal to or more virulent than the first.

Countries are rushing to vaccinate health personnel, who remain at the forefront of the battle despite lamenting numerous victims: at least 10,558 workers in this sector in the region died from covid-19 until March 5, 2021 .

“Some leaders responded to the pandemic with opportunism, denial and disregard for human rights.

We cannot continue on the path that leads to disaster, repeating mistakes, ”Erika Guevara Rosas, Amnesty International's director for the Americas, says by phone from Mexico.

Guevara Rosas remarks that Amnesty has received complaints since the beginning of the pandemic from countries such as El Salvador, the Dominican Republic and Honduras, among others, where the population has been forced "to submit to forced quarantines in state centers that did not comply with sanitary norms nor of physical distancing ”.

The pandemic has also given more power to the security forces, denounced throughout the region for the increase in arbitrary detentions and the excessive use of force.

“Many times governments present a false dilemma between protection of the right to health and the exercise of other rights,” responds the regional director of Amnesty about the isolation centers denounced by opponents and human rights organizations in the Argentine province of Formosa.

“In such an exceptional moment, a great challenge is presented for the states.

They have the possibility of limiting some rights to safeguard the right to health or life, but parallel crises cannot be created, human rights violations cannot be committed in the name of the pandemic ”, he continues.

Mass deportations

Other governments have used the pandemic as an excuse to carry out repressive policies.

“The United States authorities summarily detained and deported nearly all asylum seekers at the United States border with Mexico, and expelled more than half a million migrants and asylum seekers from March 2020 to February 2021, between them more than 13,000 unaccompanied children until November 2020 ”, the report states.

The isolation in homes decreed by governments around the world has intensified violence against women and girls in this region as well.

The organization maintains that the states have taken insufficient measures to protect victims of sexist violence and asks to reinforce prevention in the face of the second wave that is hitting more and more American countries.

The best response to the pandemic is collective, says Guevara Rosas.

"Governments have prioritized the individual response over international cooperation and this has a very high cost for the region," he says, denouncing the opacity of the contracts signed by national authorities with pharmaceutical companies and the hoarding of vaccines by the richest countries.

"It is essential that states cooperate because it is the only way out of this pandemic that does not understand borders," he concludes.

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