RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The advance of the coronavirus forced the authorities of Rio de Janeiro to close its beaches this weekend, as part of the efforts to tackle a pandemic that has already killed nearly 300,000 people in Brazil.
The iconic beaches of the “Marvelous City” dawned this Saturday and Sunday empty and under a police device to comply with the municipal decree that has prohibited any type of activity on them in the face of the tsunami of contagions and hospitalizations due to COVID-19.
During this weekend it is not allowed to stay on the sand, go for a swim, or play sports, measures added to others previously imposed to try to reduce mobility. Brazil is going through the worst moment of the pandemic with a record number of deaths, contagions and collapsed hospitals.
Some of the access roads to Copacabana and Ipanema, two of the most popular beaches in Rio de Janeiro, were blocked with tapes to prevent people from entering. Even so, the police had to intervene on occasion to remove small groups of people who were on the sand.
Read: Rio de Janeiro decrees total closure of its beaches as of Saturday due to Covid-19
The lifeguards also collaborated in the task of ensuring that no one was on the beaches, which in recent weeks had a high influx of people, despite the critical health situation in the city.
Rio de Janeiro is one of the Brazilian cities most affected by the pandemic, with almost 20,000 deaths – narrowly surpassed by São Paulo, which has twice the population – and close to 220,000 infected with SARS-CoV-2.
The public health system in the capital of the state of Rio de Janeiro, where people can often be seen walking around without masks, is at its limit, with 95% of its intensive care beds occupied, a situation which is repeated in practically the whole country.
It is the worst moment since the beginning of the pandemic, aggravated by the circulation of more infectious variants.
BOLSONARO CRITICIZED THE CLOSING OF BEACHES AND THE MAYOR RESPONDED TO HIM
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who denies the seriousness of COVID-19, criticized on the eve of the closing of the beaches of Rio de Janeiro, his electoral cradle.
The president called the decision of the mayor of Rio, Eduardo Paes, “hypocritical” because, in his opinion, it goes against the fight against the pandemic.
“Vitamin D is a way to prevent the virus from seriously affecting you. And where do you get vitamin D? By sunbathing, by golly. It’s hypocrisy,” Bolsonaro told a group of supporters, despite the fact that there is no scientific proof.
Hours later, Paes implicitly responded to the president and reinforced on his social networks that “everyone’s collaboration is fundamental” to overcome the health emergency.
“We are clear about the vitamins we all need to be healthy. One of them is the vitamin of solidarity and against the denialism of what has been happening throughout the country. We want to save lives. That is the vitamin that stimulates us,” said Paes.
PATIENTS TREATED ON THE STREETS OF RECIFE
In Recife, capital of the state of Pernambuco, in the northeast of the country, the saturation of the dedicated hospitals for COVID-19 led to patients arriving in ambulances being treated practically in the streets between Friday night and the early hours of Saturday morning.
Doctors and nurses waited, even with oxygen pipettes, for patients outside the Alfa Boa Viagem Hospital, a private entity that the regional government took over as a medical center specialized in the pandemic.
Throughout the early hours of this morning, ambulances arrived from various municipalities in the state with patients with severe cases of COVID-19 requiring care in intensive care units (ICU).
RIO AND RECIFE, REFLECTING AN EXTREME SITUATION THROUGHOUT BRAZIL
The extreme situation in Rio and Recife is experienced practically all over Brazil, with a large part of the public network collapsed or close to it, and the number of patients in the ICU is increasing.
A good part of the country’s ICUs are over 90% occupied and in some cities they are at maximum capacity.
To date, COVID-19 has left 290,314 deaths and almost 12 million positives, according to the Brazilian Ministry of Health.
This March 2021 is already the deadliest month of the pandemic in the country, with more than 35,000 deaths, with a week and a half to go.
Brazil is currently the location with the highest number of coronavirus infections and deaths per day. The daily average of deaths has been above 2,000 for the last two weeks and the number of positives broke a new record the day before, with 90,570 in 24 hours.
Bolsonaro, for his part, has decided to go to court against the health restrictions imposed in some areas of the country. In his opinion, measures such as the night curfew are “dictatorial”.