Brazil

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Cases of the new coronavirus are overwhelming hospitals, morgues and cemeteries across Brazil as Latin America’s largest nation veers closer to becoming one of the world’s pandemic hot spots.

Around 620 indigenous people live in this UNESCO-recognized biome, spread out in six different villages in a five-acre territory. They continue to struggle to maintain their language, traditions and rituals.

SÃO PAULO (AP) — Four days after firing his health minister amid the coronavirus pandemic, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said Monday he wants social isolation policies to end nationwide this week despite commitments by many states to maintain such policies.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — After more than a week suffering a cough and fever —potential signs of COVID-19— Maria do Espírito Santo went to a hospital in Manaus, Brazil’s biggest city in the Amazon rain forest. There were no beds available, just a plastic chair, so her family took her home.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro came out in public to support a small protest Sunday that defended military intervention, prompting strong criticism across the political spectrum while also infringing his own ministry’s recommendation to maintain social distancing.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro made it clear on Friday that he wants his new health minister to help protect the country’s economy as the government seeks to curb the spread of the new coronavirus.

IO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro fired his health minister on Thursday after a series of disagreements over government efforts to contain the new coronavirus. “I just heard from the President Jair Bolsonaro the news of my dismissal from the health ministry,” Luiz Henrique Mandetta posted on his verified Twitter profile, adding that he wished success to his replacement, who is yet to be named officially. He confirmed the announcement in a press conference later.

SÃO PAULO (AP) — After a heated confrontation with Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro last month over his lackadaisical approach to the coronavirus, governors in the South American country have since pulled back, wary of losing vital federal aid in the efforts to control COVID-19.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — A teenager from the Yanomami indigenous tribe has been killed by the new coronavirus in Brazil, the Health Ministry said Friday, raising alarm about the spread of the virus into protected lands.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Rio de Janeiro’s stately Copacabana Palace hotel will close its doors Friday for the first time since its inauguration 96 years ago as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

SÃO PAULO (AP) — In home isolation just months after his release from jail, Brazil’s former leader Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said Wednesday that President Jair Bolsonaro needs to change his dismissive approach to the new coronavirus or risk being forced from office before the end of his term in December 2022.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazilian health officials grappling with the new coronavirus outbreak have issued a stark warning about a lack of hospital beds, masks, testing devices and trained staff across Latin America’s largest nation.

SÃO PAULO (AP) — Major social media companies are taking aim at Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro’s dismissal of social distancing, joining others in the country who have lined up against his controversial stance regarding the new coronavirus.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Like every Sunday, Brazilian Pastor Silas Malafaia took the stage of his Pentecostal temple in a middle-class Rio de Janeiro neighborhood. But this week, he wore a T-shirt instead of a blazer and, behind the three cameras broadcasting to his legion of YouTube followers, were thousands of empty seats.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — A month ago, a massive Carnival party bursting with samba music and smiling faces raged inside Rio de Janeiro’s Sambadrome. Today, its floodlights are off and there’s no hint of celebration as its grounds serve a humanitarian purpose: protecting the homeless from the new coronavirus.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Even as coronavirus cases mount in Latin America’s largest nation, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has staked out the most deliberately dismissive position of any major world leader, calling the pandemic a momentary, minor problem and saying strong measures to contain it are unnecessary.

The threat of the coronavirus to Brazil’s low-income communities has hit home in recent days.

SÃO PAULO (AP) — Brazil’s governors are defying President Jair Bolsonaro over his call to reopen schools and businesses, dismissing his argument that the “cure” of widespread shutdowns to contain the spread of the coronavirus is worse than the disease.

SÃO PAULO (AP) — Pacaembu Stadium in downtown São Paulo is being turned into an open-air hospital to handle cases from the coronavirus outbreak.

Faced with a growing backlash, a concerned-looking Bolsonaro, flanked by many of his ministers, on Wednesday gave his first press conference on the coronavirus at Brazil’s presidential palace.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A senior Brazilian official who attended weekend events with President Donald Trump in Florida has tested positive for the coronavirus, marking the first time that someone known to have the virus was in close proximity to the president. Trump does not plan to be tested or go into self-quarantine, the White House said.