Latin American countries with high poverty rates and over-stretched public health systems are deeply concerned that the impact of coronavirus in the region could be catastrophic.
Covid-19 is most widespread in Brazil. Confirmed cases skyrocketed this week, to more than 1,500 as of Sunday, with 25 deaths. The governments of Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, where most cases are concentrated, have called for people to stay home, but President Jair Bolsonaro has criticised some of the measures as overreactions.
On Saturday 21 March the president of the bishops’ conference Walmor Oliveira de Azevedo, Archbishop of Belo Horizonte, published a video appeal urging people to stay at home. In São Paulo, the city mayor and the state governor secured a court order the day before for religious services to be suspended, forcing the Archbishop of São Paulo, Cardinal Odilo Scherer, to reverse a decision he had made the previous Monday to allow Masses to continue. The state of São Paulo, the most populous in the country, is reporting 459 cases of the disease and 15 deaths, about half the cases in Brazil, but 80 per cent of the deaths.
Latin American countries reliant on international tourism, like Peru and Colombia, have restricted entry to non-resident foreigners. Chile has closed its borders and President Sebastián Piñera announced a 90-day state of emergency. The Catholic Church has offered its buildings for the government’s use in the emergency.
Argentina has taken some of the strongest measures in the region. President Alberto Fernández implemented a mandatory two-week quarantine, during which all Argentines are required to stay home unless their job is in an essential sector. Public Masses have been suspended.
The president of the Argentine Bishops’ Conference, Bishop Óscar Vicente Ojea Quintana of San Isidro, and Cardinal Mario Aurelia Poli, Archbishop of Buenos Aires, were among church leaders meeting with Mr Fernández on 20 March. They offered Church health infrastructure and spiritual assistance.
There are particular concerns about the huge suburbs of the capital Buenos Aires, where more than 40 percent of people live below the poverty line in neighbourhoods lacking basic water and sanitation services.
As of Sunday, Venezuela reported 77 cases of coronavirus. President Nicolás Maduro announced that layoffs would be prohibited during the crisis and rent and credit payments suspended. Journalist Darvinson Rojas, who has been reporting on the pandemic, was interrogated and arrested in Caracas on Saturday. Opposition leader Juan Guaidó accused the Maduro government of hiding the real number of coronavirus cases.
Compared to other countries in Latin America, Mexico's response to the virus has been restrained. Restrictions to transit through the highly trafficked land borders to the US only began over the weekend. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has urged officials not to exaggerate the risk. Like many countries in Latin America, Mexico has a high proportion of workers in the informal sector, to whom the economic impact of a mandatory quarantine would be devastating.
Currently, Mexico has 316 confirmed cases of the virus with two deaths. The Episcopal Conference published a press release on 16 March, asking each diocese to decide independently whether to hold public Mass. On Sunday, the Basilica in Mexico City held Mass without a public for the first time.
Priests at the Mexican Pontifical College in Rome addressed a letter to the Mexican Episcopal Conference, urging the church leadership to learn from the experience of Italy. Signed by rector Víctor Ulises Vázquez Moreno, the letter said, “Not even the doctors who are trained in this field can capture the magnitude of the problem.”
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