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'Psychopathic leader': Brazil governor says Bolsonaro mishandled Covid-19 crisis
The latest wave of Covid-19, fueled by a local, more contagious variant of the coronavirus, is pushing many Brazilian hospitals to the breaking point
The governor of Brazil's Sao Paulo state on Monday, in an interview to the CNN news network, called the country's president Jair Bolsonaro a "psychopathic leader" who mishandled the Covid-19 crisis.
Responding to a question on the healthcare system in the state, Joao Doria said that much of Brazil's pandemic death toll could have been prevented had Bolsonaro "acted with the responsibility that his position gives him."
Brazil has recorded the second-most coronavirus deaths, after the United States, and the situation is worsening. Brazil's average daily death toll -- currently the highest worldwide -- has more than tripled since the start of the year, to 2,259. Brazilian media reports Bolsonaro is scrambling to find a way to deal with the surging Covid-19 cases, with the government sacking a health minister last week without naming a replacement in the official gazette.
The latest wave of Covid-19, fueled by a local, more contagious variant of the coronavirus, is pushing many Brazilian hospitals to the breaking point, news agency AFP reports.
"We are in one of those tragic moments in history when millions of people pay a high price for having an unprepared and psychopathic leader in charge of a nation," said Joao Doria, the governor of Sao Paulo, where educational institutes and commercial establishments have remained shut since early this month. One of Bolsonaro's fiercest critics, Doria also criticised the messy situation over allotment of the country's health ministry amid an unprecedented health crisis.
"We're in the middle of a pandemic... and we have two health ministers. Which in reality means we don't have any," Joao said. Sao Paulo's state government has said it had obtained guarantees from oxygen suppliers that they will be able to keep up supply for public hospitals, and announced that brewer AmBev will also produce the gas at one of its plants in the state.
Hundreds of Brazilian business leaders and economists have already called for a new policy approach as the country grapples with spiking Covid-19 deaths and overwhelmed hospitals. Rio de Janeiro, where more than 90 per cent of intensive care beds are full, announced last week that only essential shops will be allowed to open and an overnight curfew would be imposed for ten days, while beaches will remain closed.
Reuters reports that a letter, published in newspapers on Monday and signed by former central bank chiefs and some of Brazil's richest bankers, underscored a growing revolt by business leaders against the Brazillian president whom many had backed for his 2018 election. The message from such prominent economists and bankers cut at Bolsonaro's core political argument that he has defended jobs by opposing lockdowns, which the letter called a "false choice between saving lives and ensuring support for the vulnerable."
