US tops 5 million Covid-19 cases, with five states making up more than 40% of tally
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has used an online post to criticize coronavirus lockdown measures and news coverage of the pandemic, in his first comments almost a full day after Brazil surpassed 100,000 coronavirus deaths.
In a series of tweets Sunday, Bolsonaro pointed to a story published by the UK’s Daily Mail that criticizes lockdown measures to address the spread of coronavirus.
It concludes that lockdown killed two people for every three with Covid in the UK. In Brazil, even without official data, the numbers would not be very different,” Bolsonaro tweeted.
The Daily Mail article suggests “it is thought that as many as 16,000 people died because they didn’t get medical care between March 23 and May 1.” The story claims — without evidence — that those people didn’t go to hospital during lockdown because they feared catching the virus.
Bolsonaro went on to criticize Brazil’s biggest TV station without specifically naming it, saying the TV station “only spreads panic in the population and the discord among the powers” and “disdained, debauched and discouraged the use of hydroxychloroquine.”
Brazil surpassed 100,000 coronavirus deaths on Saturday the country has reported more than 3 million cases, according to the Brazilian Health Ministry.
Bolsonaro’s only mention of the 100,000 coronavirus deaths reached in his country on Saturday was to criticize the TV station’s coverage of the topic.
“In a cowardly and disrespectful manner to the 100,000 dead Brazilians, this TV celebrated that date yesterday, as a true World Cup final, blaming the President of the Republic for all the deaths,” he wrote.
He added that “misinformation kills even more than the virus itself. Time and science will show us that Covid’s political use of this TV has brought us deaths that could have been avoided.”
