As people die from Covid, friends and powerful are skipping the line to get vaccinated in Latin America, and the price could be very steep

The hope that accompanied the first vaccines in South America turned to anger as vaccination campaigns were embroiled in the scandal over cronyism and corruption, 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.

The prosecutors of these countries and Brazil, examine thousands of other allegations of wrongdoing during vaccination campaigns, most involving local politicians and family members who jumped the line.

By involving more dignitaries, allegations of crime are creating tension in a region where popular outrage over corruption and inequality is already raging. overwhelmed in the streets during noisy protests against the political status quo.

Frustration could resurface in the streets or at the polls and decide voting preferences in the upcoming elections this year, including the April elections in Peru.

“Everyone knew that patients were dying,” said Robert Campos, a doctor in Lima, of politicians in his country, “and they vaccinated all their boyfriends.”

Boredom in front of the powerful who are they skipped the line it has multiplied due to the shortage of vaccines.

South America, like other parts of the developing world, has struggled to procure enough 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 part five of all pandemic deaths worldwide – 450,000, according to the official tally – despite the fact that its population represents 5 percent of the global total.

Mortality data suggests that the death toll in the region is actually around double officers.

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 managed strengthen public support of most governments, many of which have offered financial assistance to their populations and called for unity.

Vaccine scandals could to finish with 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 look like cases Lebanon, Spain and the Philippines– 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 he lives his mother.

A prominent Argentine 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 vaccinationFor government allies.

In Brazil, prosecutors called for the arrest of the mayor of Manau, a city in the northern Amazon devastated by two waves of coronavirus, suspected of having given its allies preferential access to the vaccine.

And in Suriname, the 38-year-old health minister ordered that he receive the country’s first vaccine at “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 ministers of health of Peru and Argentina have resigned, the former official being accused of abuse of power; 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 associates using undeclared additional doses.

Some have received three doses, according to the director of the trial, Germán Málaga, in an attempt to strengthen his 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.

Just one of the old presidents, Martin 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 were hoping 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 trial in Peru includes the Minister of Health, medical regulators, university hosts of the trial and even the envoy of the Vatican for the country.

The nuncio, Nicola Girasoli, told the local press that he received the vaccine for acting like “ethics consultantFor the university leading the trial.

After his resignation, Peru’s Minister of Health Pilar Mazzetti said that receiving the injection had been “the worst mistake of my life“.

Another official who benefited from the trial, Foreign Minister Elizabeth Astete, also resigned after defending herself saying that “Couldn’t afford” to get sick while working.

The vaccine scandal could shake the Peruvian general elections, to be held in April, benefiting candidates promising a radical break with the current political system, said Alfredo Torres, head of the Ipsos polling station in Lima.

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

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 over health workers, which has raised complaints in the medical community.

In Brazil, who only vaccinated 3 percent of its population, a third of the country’s 210 million inhabitants are now on the priority vaccination list, a figure 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 decision of the Brazilian government to partially delegate the vaccination order to the local authorities this has compounded the confusion and created a kaleidoscope of conflicting regulations.

Some prosecutors investigating the vaccine scandal have said that bureaucratic chaos it may have been deliberately magnified 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 reports in Caracas; Ank Kuipers in Paramaribo; José María León Cabrera in Quito and Jenny Carolina González in Bogotá.

The New York Times