Brazil, on the edge: devastated by coronavirus, faces an epidemic of hunger

RÍO DE JANEIRO.- Skeletal teenagers standing in front of cars at red lights with a sign that says “FOME” (hungry in Portuguese) in huge black letters. Flocks of children, many without school for a year, begging at the door of supermarkets and passing table by table in restaurants. Entire families crowded into makeshift tents on the sidewalks, asking for powdered milk, cookies, whatever.

After a year of pandemic, millions of Brazilians are hungry. These scenes have been repeated for months in the streets of Brazil as irrefutable proof that the president’s bet Jair Bolsonaro – preserving the economy at the expense of public health measures aimed at curbing the virus – has been a failure.

The Brazilian president was suspicious from the start of the severity of the disease and scoffed at recommendations from public health experts, arguing that economic damage from quarantines, store closures and mobility restrictions posed a threat worse than the pandemic for the fragile people of the country. economy.

This equation has led to Brazil having the highest death rate in the world, but also the failure of its supposed goal: to keep the country afloat.

The virus is break down the social fabric and set frightening recordsAs the worsening health crisis pushes businesses into bankruptcy, pulverizes jobs and further cripples an economy that has grown little or nothing for more than six years.

Last year the government’s emergency family income helped put food on the tables of millions of Brazilians, but this year that amount has dropped dramatically and there is a impending family debt crisis who has to empty the cupboards of the houses.

Double hungry

About 19 million Brazilians went hungry in 2020, nearly double the number in 2018, according to the Brazilian government and a study on deprivation during the pandemic made by experts in the field.

In 2020, about 117 million people, or about 55% of Brazil’s total population, were food insecure., with uncertain access to adequate nutrition, a huge jump from the 85 million people in this situation in the previous two years, according to the same study.

“The government’s approach to the pandemic has worsened poverty and inequality,” says Douglas Belchior, founder of UNEafro BrasiHim, one of the organizations that came together to raise funds and distribute food bags in vulnerable communities. “Hunger is a serious and untreated problem in Brazil.”

Luana de Souza is 32 years old and is one of the many mothers who stand in line at a makeshift picnic area hoping to grab a bundle of beans, rice or a bottle of oil.

Her husband worked in an event organization company, and last year he lost his job: he was one of eight million Brazilians who, during the pandemic, increased the number of unemployment, What is already above 14%, according to the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics.

At first the De Souza family made do with government help, taking care of every penny, but this year the payments were reduced and there was no way out. “There is no work”, says Luana. “And the bills keep coming in.”

The Brazilian economy entered recession in 2014 and, when the pandemic hit, it had not yet recovered. Bolsonaro liked to invoke realities like those of the De Souza family, who cannot afford to stay at home without working, to argue that restrictions and quarantines in Europe and other wealthy countries were unachievable in Brazil.

Extreme measures “

Last year, when governors and mayors across the country decreed the closure of non-essential businesses and restrictions on mobility, Bolsonaro called the measures “extreme” and warned that they would bring malnutrition. He has also dismissed the threat of the virus, cast doubt on vaccines – which his government has been slow to acquire – and often encouraged the participation of his supporters in major political events.

This year, when the second wave led to the collapse of the health care system in several cities, local authorities again imposed strict measures and waged a war with Bolsonaro. “People should have the freedom and the right to work,” Bolsonaro said last month, calling the new quarantine measures imposed by local governments “living in a dictatorship”.

Earlier this month, when the daily death toll from the virus has reached over 4,000, Bolsonaro recognized the seriousness of the humanitarian crisis facing your country. But he took no responsibility, instead blaming the local authorities. “Brazil is at the limit,” he admitted, blaming those who “closed everything”.

But economists say the argument that restrictions to control the virus could worsen the economic recession was “a false dilemma.”

In an open letter to Brazilian authorities at the end of March, more than 1,500 economists and businessmen called on the government to impose tougher measures, including shutting down the economy. “It is illogical to expect an economic recovery in the midst of an uncontrolled epidemic,” the letter said.

According to Thomas Conti, a professor at Insper Business School, Bolsonaro’s approach has had broad destabilizing effects. “The Brazilian real was the most devalued currency of all developing countries,” Conti says. “The level of unemployment is alarming, there is no predictability for the country’s future, fiscal rules are being violated and inflation is growing unchecked.”

The worsening health crisis has left Bolsonaro in a vulnerable political situation. This month, the Senate launched an inquiry into the government’s handling of the pandemic. The report is expected to document all the missteps, including government support for ineffective drugs to treat Covid and shortages of basic medical supplies such as oxygen. And these missteps are likely to be credited with many preventable deaths.

Earlier this year, human rights organizations launched the campaign To hungry people (“There are hungry people”), with the aim of raising funds from businesses and individuals to bring bags of food to people in need across the country.

Belchior, one of the campaign’s promoters, says more families are turning to foraging. And he adds: “As the government no longer helps, they depend more and more on community solidarity campaigns.

The New York Times

Translation of Jaime Arrambide

The New York Times