MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Bolsonaro's wife takes COVID-19 vaccine, stirs controversy

”Taking a vaccine is a personal decision,” Bolsonaro insisted.

Brazil's First Lady Michelle Bolsonaro has taken a vaccine against COVID-19, during the couple's recent trip to New York City, where President Jair Bolsonaro delivered a speech before the United Nations' 76th General Assembly earlier this week.

”Taking a vaccine is a personal decision. My wife (Michelle Bolsonaro), for example, decided to take it in the United States. I did not take it,“ the head of state said in an interview published by Veja magazine.

Information as to which immunizer the 39-year-old Mrs. Bolsonaro has received has not been disclosed.

”This scene of the first lady getting vaccinated in the United States is unfortunate, it devalues the health authorities, devalues a conquest of the country that is already more than 30 years old, such as the National Immunization Program,” said Senator Randolfe Rodrigues, vice chairman of the Parliamentary Investigation Commission (CPI) dwelving into the President's alleged acts of corruption in the purchase of vaccines.

On the other hand, CPI Chairman Senator Omar Aziz ironically said “someone had to tell her that the vaccine they apply in the United States is the same that is applied in Brazil.”

“She could well have been vaccinated in Brazil and show it to everyone, to set a good example. If that had been the case, we would have seen an act of real patriotism, not lip service,” he added.

Meanwhile, the President remained isolated Friday in Brasilia, where his son and two other close contacts of him announced that they had tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, in addition to Health Minister Marcelo Queiroga's case, who had to stay in New York City after his own results.

Eduardo Bolsonaro, Agriculture Minister Tereza Cristina da Costa Dias and unionist Bruno Branco -who did not travel with the presidential entourage- have all caught COVID-19, it was reported. “I am feeling good and I began to treat myself immediately,” said Eduardo Bolsonaro, who has taken a first dose of Pfizer's vaccine in late August.

“We know that vaccines were made faster than the pattern determines. Does this mean that the vaccine is useless? I do not believe it. But this is one more argument against the health passport,” Congressman Bolsonaro added in reference to New York Mayor Bill De Blasio's health pass mandate which had put his father's appearance before the UN in doubt and was even preventing from eating at local restaurants.

“I know De Blasio is a Marxist who follows Antonio Gramsci” and is not quite different from Venezuela's regime, the President's son went on.