10 Apr 2021 / 08:59 H.
(Adds COVID-19 numbers)
By Eduardo Simões and Pedro Fonseca
SAO PAULO, March 31 (Reuters) - Brazil has detected a new COVID-19 variant that is similar to the one first seen in South Africa, the head of Sao Paulo s Butantan institute said on Wednesday, as Latin America s biggest country notched another record daily death toll.
Butantan President Dimas Covas said the patient with the variant had no history of travel to South Africa. The South African variant has alarmed public health experts as there are questions of how effective current vaccines are against it. Brazil is grappling with its own homegrown variant, called P1, which appears to be fueling a record-breaking run of infections.
God willing we will soon be solving that Sputnik issue, said Bolsonaro on social media
Brazil s President Jair Bolsonaro spoke Tuesday on the telephone with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, about the possible purchase of Sputnik V, the anti-Covid-19 vaccine developed by the Gamaleya Institute for Research in Epidemiology and Microbiology.
Both leaders also discussed other strategies against the coronavirus pandemic, including registration of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine in Brazil, its supplies and production.
Bolsonaro later posted on social media that it was a very productive conversation, God willing we will soon be solving that Sputnik issue, about a version of the Sputnik V vaccine manufactured entirely in Brazil, which has not yet been cleared for application by local health authorities.
Brazilian watchdogâs delegation to visit Sputnik V production in Russia â chief
The Anvisa chief added that the watchdog will soon meet with Russian Ambassador to Brazil Alexei Labetsky to discuss this matter
RIO DE JANEIRO, April 7. /TASS/. A delegation of Brazil’s National Health Surveillance Agency (Anvisa) will pay a visit to Russia to inspect the Sputnik V production facility, the organization’s head, Antonio Barra Torres, said on Tuesday. In the course of the conversation between presidents [Jair] Bolsonaro and [Vladimir] Putin, it was confirmed that our sanitary mission will be sent to Russia, on Russia’s consent, so that we could examine the enterprise producing both the vaccine itself and its ingredients, the official said in a video, posted on the Brazilian leader’s Facebook page.
HEALTH experts accused the Brazilian government of sabotaging public health measures after the country’s daily Covid-19 death toll surpassed 4,000 on Tuesday.
“The anti-lockdown narrative of President Jair Bolsonaro has won,” Institute for Health Policy Studies executive director Miguel Lago said, as Brazil became the third country globally, after the United States and Peru, to record the grim milestone.
“Mayors and governors are politically prohibited from beefing up social distancing policies because they know supporters of the president, including business leaders, will sabotage it,” he said.
Over 90 per cent of intensive care beds are now occupied in most Brazilian states and hundreds are dying before beds become available.
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Health care workers of the public Mobile Emergency Service bring a patient suspected of suffering from COVID-19 to the Base Public Hospital in Brasilia, Brazil, March 31, 2021. Credit:
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Gustavo Pinto’s daily soundtrack is filled with the beeps and hums of lifesaving machines in the intensive care unit of Sao Jose Regional Hospital.
As an infectologist, he spends six days a week at the hospital located just outside of Florianopolis, Brazil.
“I can’t just stay home for longer periods, despite having a wife and a 6-year-old child because my head doesn’t turn off,” he said. “So, I prefer to come, do what needs to be done, and then go home.”