The Minister of Health, Marcelo Queiroga, met today (17) with the president of the Federal Supreme Court (STF), Luiz Fux, to discuss the possibility of changing the emergency situation in the country caused by the covid-19 pandemic.
“Today we have a scenario of deceleration of covid-19 in Brazil, in most of the country and some states and municipalities are already heading towards a situation of control. Within that context we discussed the issue of the duration of the health emergency of national importance,” he said.
He added that sometimes people “mistaken to turn a pandemic into an endemic”. “It is not the minister’s prerogative to turn a pandemic into an endemic one. What the minister does is, within the law, establish the duration of the health emergency of national importance in accordance with the international health regulation,” he said.
Queiroga has already been with senate president, Rodrigo Pacheco, and from the Chamber of Deputies, Arthur Lira, to clarify the government’s intention to start the transition to the milder category of health emergency. THE measure is under study and was announced earlier this month by President Jair Bolsonaro.
Queiroga explained that the change in classification will have an effect on emergency records of some vaccines and medicines for the treatment of covid-19, which will need to be preserved with the change. The Attorney General of the Union, Bruno Bianco, also participated in the hearing.
Marcelo Queiroga also stated that the decision on the reclassification will be taken based on the epidemiological analysis and evaluation of the technical areas of the ministry, Anvisa, states and municipalities.
“In the last 15 days, we had a drop in the number of cases and the number of deaths. Our vaccination campaign is one of the main in the world. The Unified Health System (SUS) was strengthened during the pandemic with budget resources”, he said. .
The covid-19 pandemic was recognized by the World Health Organization (WHO) in March 2020.
