Patricia Beatriz was 38 years old and died in Goiânia without ever knowing her baby daughter. She was 34 weeks pregnant when she was diagnosed with COVID-19. Danilo Moura, 41 years old, was a nurse in Acre and caught the Coronavirus working on the front line. He was hospitalized on July 1 and died a few days later. Chief Aritana Yawalapiti, an indigenous leader from the Upper Xingu region, was 71 years old when he felt a severe pain while on a fishing trip. He died two weeks later.
Eight out of ten of the world’s women who have died from COVID while pregnant or puerperal (the six week period after giving birth) have died in Brazil. The nation is also a world leader in the death of health workers who have died as a result of this pandemic. Indigenous people are the ethnic group with the highest mortality rate from the disease in the country. The indifference with which our indigenous peoples are treated, a veritable genocide, threatens the annihilation of cultures that have survived for millennia.
Patricia, a mother, Danilo, a nurse, and Aritana, an indigenous man, are three of the more than 100,000 victims of COVID-19 in Brazil. The numbers of the pandemic, announced daily on TV with colorful graphics, reveal almost nothing of the human beings behind the cold statistics. They do not speak of the pain of those who have lost loved ones and have not even had the right to a dignified farewell. They do not speak of the dreams that were buried along with the bodies.
The numbers – more than a thousand deaths every day – are now treated as just another everyday fact, like the weather forecast on the Globo Network’s TV news program Jornal Nacional. In the process of the trivialization of death, the lives lost seem like an inescapable fatality, as inevitable as night follows the day.
A few days ago, the President of the Republic said that what is required is to “get on with life”. This just demonstrates his disdain, as he always does, for those who have already gone and the many others who will lose their lives to the virus. It is as if the lives of working people and black people on the periphery, the vast majority of the victims of the disease, are worth nothing.
In response to appeals from the business community, who are thirsting for profit, and bowing down to Bolsonaro, who is thirsting for blood, governors and mayors are recommencing the movement of people and commercial activities. The daily quota of human sacrifice is the “new normal”.
In this way, we have since June reached a macabre plateau that appears to be without end. From the top of the mountain of bodies, the words “there are ICU beds available” are shouted to all those who will suffer the severe symptoms of the disease. The main objective then is to no longer save the lives of as many people as possible (which can only be done with effective social distancing and mass testing), but to manage the thousands of deaths without affecting business activities. At the current pace, we will reach 200,000 official deaths by mid-October. The cynicism and moral degradation of those who govern and the big bourgeoisie have reached incalculable levels of depravity.
The trivialization of the pandemic and the pressure to reopen schools
The fatigue caused by the pandemic which has lasted for five long months, and the devastation to jobs and income caused by the brutal economic crisis (8.9 million people had already lost their jobs by June) all aid the propaganda campaign that seeks to trivialize the pandemic. This vile campaign led by Jair Bolsonaro, is sponsored by the ruling class and is now supported, with little effort to hide it, by governors and mayors.
A significant part of the population, especially the bolsonaristas, has been won over to this idea. But it is not true that the majority of the Brazilian people have given in to the indifference and apathy propagated by the governing authorities and the bourgeoisie. The working class has overwhelmingly adhered to social distancing to the extent that it is concretely possible, is opposed to the genocidal policy of Bolsonaro, is in solidarity with those close to them, and continues to be troubled by the spread of the disease.
Right now, the main battle is the fight against the reopening of schools – perhaps one of the last collective frontiers in the fight against the Coronavirus. The full resumption of capitalist business requires classes to return, so that in particular mothers, as well as fathers, are free to completely return to work without having to spend many hours of their day caring for their children.
As several studies have shown, the reopening of schools will inevitably lead to a worsening of the pandemic. First, because the daily transit of millions of students, teachers and education workers will considerably increase movement within the cities. Second, because it will cause the contamination of many children and adolescents, who will bring the virus home to their parents and grandparents, many of whom are in the high risk category. Finally, it will cause the infection – and as a consequence, the death – of many education professionals. A school year can recover, lives lost cannot.
The struggle for life and working class resistance
Despite all the difficulties and the pain imposed by this unprecedented humanitarian tragedy, working people continue to resist and fight back. Even with the work overload from having their children at home, mothers and fathers, for the most part, do not want the schools to reopen and are supportive of the struggle waged by education professionals. Popular pressure was very important in the approval by Congress of the FUNDEB basic education funding bill, something which ran against the line of the Bolsonaro government, which worked against the increase in public resources for basic education.
Another example of resistance comes from the struggle of the food app delivery riders and drivers. They have held two national days of strikes which have helped to highlight the cruel exploitation that they suffer. We also have the courageous struggle of the metalworkers of Renault, in Paraná, who went on strike against the sacking of 747 workers, and forced the justice system to, at least for now, prevent mass dismissal.
The struggle of São Paulo’s subway workers is also worthy of mention. These essential workers, who guarantee public transport in the country’s largest city, had their rights torn up by Governor João Doria in the midst of the pandemic. With the declaration of a strike in the paulista (São Paulo) capital, subway workers have managed to prevent this attack. The postal workers of Correios are also preparing their struggle, and have set their national strike in defense of their rights and against the privatization of the state-owned company for October 18.
The struggle for life unites the vast majority of the Brazilian people. Even with the reinforcement of the politics of death in the name of big capitalist profits – whether in the savage form of Bolsonaro or the more subtle form of most governors and mayors – the struggles of the working class are making headway.
It is true to say that these are still defensive mobilizations in the context of a humanitarian tragedy and a neo-fascist government that maintains the support of a significant part of the population. But these partial mobilizations are seeds for a greater battle: the necessary mass struggle for the overthrow of Bolsonaro and his genocidal government, that is needed to save lives, jobs, social rights and democratic freedoms.
This article is an English translation of “Cem mil vidas perdidas: não aceite ‘o novo normal’”, Esquerda Online (EOL), 08/08/2020.
Translation: Bobby Sparks
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