BRAZIL announced yesterday it will “in the coming days” lift public health emergency measures in place for over two years, citing a drop in the number of deaths and infections.

More than 660,000 people died of the virus in Brazil, one of the hardest-hit countries second only to the United States.

However, the number of infections and deaths has fallen dramatically as authorities ramped up immunisation, with about 75% of its 212 million people now fully vaccinated.

Health Minister Marcelo Queiroga said yesterday the public health emergency declared on February 3, 2020 – when the virus started spreading globally after it first emerged in Wuhan, China – will soon end.

“We have the conditions to announce today the end of the health emergency,” Queiroga said on television, adding that the announcement will be formalised by a decree “in the next few days”.

“However, this does not mean the end of Covid-19. We will continue to live with the virus,” the minister said.

The decision came after Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro, who famously dismissed the virus as “a little flu”, asked his minister a few weeks ago to decree an “end to the pandemic” and called for a return to normalcy.

Earlier this month, Brazil also loosened restrictions for international travellers, scrapping a 14-day quarantine for vaccinated foreign visitors.

The far-right Covid-sceptic president is up for re-election this year, and has come under fire in the past for his handling of the pandemic. – AFP, April 18, 2022.