The President Jair Bolsonaro is pushing for the end to the lockdown as the Corona virus takes a toll on the economy. The president’s push to reopen comes despite more than 15,000 deaths in Brazil, with no signs of slowing.
Earlier this month, the Economic Minister said Brazil could face “economic collapse” in a month’s time due to stay-at-home measures to stem the coronavirus outbreak, with food shortages and “social disorder”
“Within about 30 days, there may start to be shortages on (store) shelves and production may become disorganized, leading to a system of economic collapse, of social disorder” Guedes said.
Hospitals are nearly out of intensive care beds in the hardest-hit areas, including Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Manaus, the biggest city in the Amazon region, which has had to turn to refrigerator trucks and mass graves to cope with the number of dead.
Because of the pandemic, Brazil — which was just coming off a massive recession in 2015 and 2016 — is facing an economic contraction of 5.3 percent this year, the International Monetary Fund forecasts.
Bolsonaro won election in 2018 promising to jump-start the economy with austerity cuts, privatizations and fiscal reforms.
The pandemic now threatens to derail that project, battering the economy and forcing the government to undertake massive stimulus spending.
