"They killed my mother! " Paula Ribeiro, 34, has been talking for twenty minutes without stopping. A flood of words, interspersed with tears of despair, but also with fierce rage. On April 22, this resident of Manaus, the largest city in the Amazon and epicenter of the Covid-19 epidemic in Brazil, lost her mother. Victim of the new coronavirus crisis and the collapse of the country's health system.
" Dona " Amalia was 53 years old. Diabetic, suffering from hypertension, she fell ill at the end of March. Pain, fever, fatigue, then cough and breathing difficulties: the classic symptoms of Covid-19. “But the doctors we called, like the hospitals, refused to test or take care of her. They told us, “There are too many people, come home. Only come in an emergency "", says Paula.
On April 22, the state of Amalia got worse. She suffocates, dies. "I called the emergency services, but they were already overwhelmed. " Panicked, the family puts the mother in a car and takes her to the emergency room at Nilton-Lins Hospital. But this unit, open especially for patients with Covid-19, only receives patients sent by other hospitals. The medics are reluctant to open the door to a patient they already believe is dead.
Screams, screams, tears. After ten minutes, unconscious Amalia is taken care of. "She died two hours later and they didn't even test her. On his death certificate, it says “undetermined cause”, protests Paula Ribeiro. If she had been taken care of in time, we could have saved her. It's revolting. What happened to my mother can happen to anyone here. "
The epidemic is exploding
As part of the world is fading, the Covid-19 epidemic is exploding in Brazil. As of May 17, the country officially counted 241,000 positive cases, more than in Spain or Italy. The number of deaths now exceeds 16,000 and has doubled in about ten days, with the highest daily mortality recorded outside the United States. And the peak is only expected for the month of June …
All the researchers are alarmist. Take those from the Covid-19 Brasil center: according to them, the country could actually count between 2.5 and 3.4 million positive cases, 15 times more than the official figures. Brazil has the highest contagion rate in the world for Imperial College London, with an R0 2.8 – each sick person will in turn infect an average of 2.8 new people. The University of Washington, alarmist, predicts as many as 193,000 victims by August in the country.
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