Brazil's fourth COVID wave is a "time bomb," warns researcher Lucas Ferrante
Our reporter
2 hours ago
The fourth wave of the pandemic in Brazil is taking place amid an explosive combination of factors: stagnation in vaccinations, an end of the COVID-19 health emergency, increasing spread of the most infectious and vaccine-resistant BA.4/5 Omicron subvariants, the abandonment of the most basic mitigation measures, such as mask wearing in closed places, and the arrival of winter.
On Tuesday, Brazil registered a moving average of 147 deaths and 40,174 cases, an increase of 21 percent and 10 percent, respectively, from two weeks ago. Besides the huge under-reporting, six of the 27 Brazilian states didn’t release any pandemic data.
For Lucas Ferrante, researcher at the National Institute for Amazonian Research (INPA), with whom the WSWS spoke last Saturday, this situation has turned Brazil into a “time bomb” that could lead to a new health collapse in the coming weeks.
Studies led by Ferrante showed that the late 2020 reopening of schools in Manaus, the capital of Amazonas state, triggered the emergence of the Gamma variant, responsible for two-thirds of COVID deaths in Brazil. Today, particularly after all Brazilian states have ended mandatory mask wearing in classrooms, the role of schools as vectors of virus transmission is more than clear.
More:
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/06/24/wfyn-j24.html
