“Death Championship“with for mascot”Covidinho“: Critics rocketed in Brazil after the announcement on Monday of the choice of this country to organize the Copa América football at a moment’s notice when the Covid-19 killed more than 460,000 there.
“An event of this magnitude will cause countless displacements, even if the matches are behind closed doors. And this will contribute to the resurgence of the pandemic“, with the threat of a third wave in the coming weeks, deplores for AFP José David Urbáez from the Brasilia Infectious Disease Center.
“This tournament should have been canceled, period“, he adds.
The South American Football Confederation (Conmebol) announced Monday morning that the competition which must pit world stars like Neymar, Messi or Cavani would take place in Brazil on the dates initially planned (June 13 to July 10), after the successive withdrawals from Colombia and Argentina.
“In other countries, such as Chile, vaccination is much more advanced and the pandemic is much better controlled. It’s hard to understand where this decision came from“, considers for his part the epidemiologist Pedro Hallal, Federal University of Pelotas.
Brazil has the second-deadliest death toll in the world after the United States, and only 11% of the population has received two doses of the vaccine.
When announcing this surprising choice of host country, Conmebol thanked the far-right president Jair Bolsonaro to get “opened the doors of his country to the safest sporting event in the world“.
Legal battle in sight
Enough to arouse bitter reactions from his political opponents, who already reproached him for having constantly minimized the extent of the health crisis, with his anti-confinement discourse against scientific guidelines and the refusal of vaccine offers.
The senator Renan Calheiros, rapporteur of a parliamentary committee of inquiry of the Senate which is examining the chaotic management of the pandemic, described the Copa América in Brazil of “death championship“.
“Vaccine offers molded in drawers, but they were quick to agree to host Copa America“, he launched on Twitter.
The vice-president of this commission, Randolfe Rodrigues, called for the hearing before the senators of Rogerio Caboclo, president of the Brazilian Football Confederation, to explain “what measures are planned to guarantee the safety of Brazilians“.
The Left MP Julio Delgado has for its part announced its intention to seize the Supreme Court to cancel the tournament, whose host cities have not yet been defined.
The governors of two northeastern states, Pernambuco and Rio Grande do Norte, which have modern stadiums that have hosted the 2014 World Cup, have already announced that they would refuse to host matches by “lack of health security“.
From the public to the Maracana?
In Brazil, matches have been held behind closed doors since the start of the pandemic, even though the Copa Libertadores final at the end of January was played in the presence of a few hundred supporters invited by clubs and federations.
According to the Brazilian press, Conmebol would like to do the same for a possible Copa América final at the legendary Maracana stadium in Rio.
On social networks, Internet users had a blast, with montages showing a Copa América mascot called “Covidinho” or “Chloroquito“, an allusion to hydroxychloroquine, drug whose merits Jair Bolsonaro continues to praise despite scientific studies proving its ineffectiveness against the virus.
In the streets of Sao Paulo, the Brazilians were also very critical. “Such an important event should not be organized at this time. It’s good for the economy, but it will increase the number of contaminations. I’m against it, even though I love football“, said to the AFP Guilherme Silva’s beser, which works in import-export.
