Vaccination scandals in Latin America: the powerful and their allies leap the line

By Mitra Taj, Anatoly Kurmanaev, Manuela Andreoni and Daniel Politi

LIMA, Peru – The hope that came with the first vaccines in South America turned to anger as vaccination campaigns were mixed up with thcrony and corruption scandal, shaking national governments and undermining confidence in the political class.

Four ministers in Peru, Argentina and Ecuador resigned this month or are under investigation because they are believed to have received or granted preferential access to the few injections against COVID-19. Prosecutors in those countries and in Brazil are looking into thousands of other allegations of wrongdoing during vaccination campaigns, most involving local politicians and their family members who jumped the line.

By involving more dignitaries, the crime allegations are creating tension in a region where popular outrage over corruption and inequality has already spilled over into the streets in strong protests against the political status quo. Frustration could again surface on the streets or at the polls and decide voting preferences for the upcoming elections this year, including the April elections in Peru.

“They all knew the patients were dying,” said Robert Campos, a doctor in Lima, of politicians in his country, “and they vaccinated every last crowd of their people.”

Boredom with the powerful who jumped the line has increased due to the shortage of vaccines. South America, like other parts of the developing world, has struggled to procure sufficient doses as wealthy countries purchased available supplies.

Campos said he was not on the immunization list last week when limited doses arrived for hospital staff.

South America has been devastated by the virus, recording nearly a fifth of all pandemic deaths worldwide – 450,000, according to the official tally – despite its population making up 5% of the global total. Mortality data suggests that in reality the death toll in the region is double the official number.

The virus has also overwhelmed national health systems, pushed millions of people into poverty and plunged the region into the worst economic crisis in modern history.

Despite this, the pandemic has succeeded in building public support from most governments, several of which have offered financial assistance to their populations and called for unity.

Vaccine scandals could end this temporary relief and usher in a new wave of instability, analysts warn.

“It is much harder for people to tolerate corruption when health is at stake,” said Mariel Fornoni, a pollster in Buenos Aires.

The recklessness of some of these scandals – which resemble cases in Lebanon, Spain and the Philippines – has scandalized the region.

In Peru, a deputy minister received additional doses from a clinical trial with his wife, sister, two children, a nephew and a niece. The Ecuadorian minister sent doses of the first batch to arrive in the country, intended for the public sector, to the private luxury asylum where his mother lives.

A prominent Argentinian journalist announced in a radio interview last week that he had been vaccinated at the health ministry after a call to a friend, then a minister, exposing what people called a “VIP vaccination” for them. government allies. ANDIn Brazil, prosecutors have called for the arrest of the mayor of Manaus, a city in the northern Amazon devastated by two waves of coronavirus, suspected of giving his allies preferential access to the vaccine.

And in Suriname, the 38-year-old health minister ordered he receive the country’s first vaccine to “set an example.”

As discoveries accumulated, citizens of South America took to social media to speak out against the abuses and identify those suspected of skipping the line. Peruvian doctors and nurses protested outside hospitals demanding vaccines as the irregular vaccination scandal escalated.

The health ministers of Peru and Argentina, where the former official was accused of abuse of power, have resigned; In Ecuador, the Minister of Health is facing an impeachment trial and a criminal investigation.

The vaccine scandal had a particular echo in Peru, where the pandemic has killed more than 45,000 people, according to the official toll, although data on excessive deaths suggests the actual number could be more than double.

This month, the doctor in charge of Peru’s first clinical vaccine trial admitted to inoculating nearly 250 politicians, personalities and close collaborators with undeclared extra doses. Some were given three doses, according to trial director Germán Málaga, in an attempt to boost their immunity.

The scandal rocked a country already embroiled in a series of corruption investigations that have eroded confidence in democratic institutions and trapped the country’s last six former presidents.

Only one of the former presidents, Martín Vizcarra, left office with high approval ratings, thanks to his stance on corruption. Now Vizcarra is embroiled in the vaccine trials scandal after learning he was vaccinated during his tenure and tried to hide it.

“We had high hopes he was the right person,” said Ana Merino, a newspaper seller in Lima who lost her husband to COVID last year. “So who are we getting closer to?” Who is left?

The list of illicit beneficiaries of the Peru trial includes the Minister of Health, medical regulators, academic hosts for the trial, and even the Vatican envoy to the country. The nuncio, Nicola Girasoli, told local press he received the vaccine for acting as an “ethics consultant” for the university that was conducting the trial.

After his resignation, the Peruvian Minister of Health, Pilar Mazzetti, declared that receiving the injection was “the worst mistake of my life”. Another official who benefited from the lawsuit, Foreign Minister Elizabeth Astete, also resigned after defending herself saying she “could not afford” to fall ill while working.

The vaccine scandal could spark a general election in Peru, to be held in April.l, benefiting candidates who promise a radical break with the current political system, said Alfredo Torres, head of the Ipsos poll in Lima.

Among them, Keiko Fujimori, the daughter of an imprisoned former president, who promised to make the country a “demodure” – a word that mixes democracy and dictatorship – and Rafael López Aliaga, who proposed death sentences for politicians. corrupt.

As most countries in the region have so far received only a fraction of the vaccines they need, various groups are vying for priority.

In Peru and Venezuela, governments have said security forces will be given priority alongside health workers, prompting complaints from the medical community.

In Brazil, which has only vaccinated 3% of its population, a third of the country’s 210 million people are now on the priority vaccination list, a number that far exceeds the number of doses available. The group includes vets, who claim to work in the healthcare industry, truck drivers, who have threatened to strike if they are not vaccinated, and psychologists, firefighters and construction workers.

The Brazilian government’s decision to partially delegate the vaccination order to local authorities has compounded the confusion and created a kaleidoscope of conflicting regulations. Some prosecutors investigating the vaccine scandal said the bureaucratic chaos may have been deliberately amplified to hide favoritism and corruption.

“Doctors call me all the time to tell me that they are afraid of dying,” because they do not have access to vaccines, said Edmar Fernandes, president of the medical union of the Brazilian state of Ceará. “This kind of corruption kills.”

* Mitra Taj reported from Lima, Anatoly Kurmanaev from Caracas, Manuela Andreoni from Rio de Janeiro and Daniel Politi from Buenos Aires.

** Collaboration with Isayen Herrera Reporting in Caracas; Ank Kuipers in Paramaribo; José María León Cabrera in Quito and Jenny Carolina González in Bogotá.

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