He finally caught it. Tuesday, July 7, Jair Bolsonaro announced that he had tested positive for Covid-19. The far-right Brazilian president announced the news in his own way: extravagant, inimitable. To show everyone that he was in top form, Jair Bolsonaro did not hesitate to take off his mask and question the handful of journalists present in front of him in Brasilia. "Like that, you can see my face, see that I am fine, that I am quiet and at peace! ", launched the head of state, radiant but contagious, in front of a press as surprised as it was frantic.
The first warning signs were felt on Sunday. "An indisposition, which worsened on Monday, with discomfort, fatigue, a little muscle pain, and a fever in the late afternoon which reached 38 ° C"detailed Jair Bolsonaro from the Palace of Dawn, the sumptuous residence of Brazilian heads of state. Faced with worsening symptoms, the President urgently performed a tomography scan and a Covid-19 screening test. Result: positive.
More than shared reactions
In a country under stress, where the virus has already killed more than 66,000 people and 1.6 million people, reactions to the president’s health have been more than mixed. "It only remains to wish him a full recovery", sharply tweeted former justice minister Sergio Moro, now in opposition.
Some have gone even further: "I am in favor of his illness getting worse and dying", went so far as to write the editorialist Hélio Schwartsman, in a column published by the Folha de Sao Paulo. "In the immediate future, the absence of Bolsonaro would mean that we would no longer have (in Brazil) a leader minimizing the epidemic and sabotaging measures to mitigate it. Couldn't it save lives, could it? ", asked the journalist. And to conclude: "By dying, Bolsonaro would render a service that he was unable to offer in his lifetime. "
Need we recall the number of controversies launched by the President of Brazil over the Covid-19, this "Grippette", this event "Oversized" according to him ? For the past four months, Jair Bolsonaro has kept putting the pandemic into perspective. Just this week, he vetoed several articles of a law on the wearing of masks in public space, passed by Congress. Thanks to the president, it will now be possible to go unprotected to shops, factories, churches and even overcrowded prisons …
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