The umpteenth gaffe by López Obrador about the pandemic after his second contagion

The president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, is crowned as one of the most controversial leaders for his management of the pandemic for his refusal to wear a mask, his mass baths and, now, test positive for COVID-19 after meeting with journalists and minimize the disease.

“I woke up hoarse“The Mexican president without a mask acknowledged on Monday in his press conference from the National Palace in which he assured that he believed it was a flu.

Hours later, he was tested for COVID-19 and tested positive for the second time in a year. He has minor symptoms and is isolated in his home, the National Palace.

But the gesture has outraged part of Mexican society for neglecting public health recommendations, although the president maintains an unalterable high popularity and his critics are already used to his occurrences.

On Twitter, the hashtags #fuerzapresident and #irresponsable are trending, although messages of support win.

“I think it has no political consequence, but in its popularity I think so, especially in the medical union that is currently receiving the attacks of the fourth wave of infections”Said Carolina Gómez, teacher in public health.

Penultimate controversy

Since the beginning of the health crisis, the president has been controversial: “You have to hug, nothing happens,” he said when there were still few cases in the country and he still visited towns handing out kisses and collective photos.

And in March 2020, in an unprecedented exercise, he showed some stamps and scapulars against COVID-19 as a way to stop the disease.

Throughout the pandemic, the president has shown unconditional optimism, assuring on many occasions that the disease was already “tamed.”

And soon he returned to his tours of the country. Always without a mask, with which he has been seen on very few occasions: “I am going to put on a mask, you know when, when there is no corruption,” he said in July 2020.

Last year, and despite testing positive in January and suffering from hypertension, he did not change his strategy either. In fact, he announced his first contagion after a weekend full of mass events.

And on December 1, when it was three years since he came to power and the world was already worried about the new variant, the 68-year-old president gathered about 150,000 people in the capital’s Zócalo.

“We have two years with unfortunate statements and late and failed decisions,” said Gómez.

In tune with other leaders?

López Obrador has often been branded a “populist” and compared in the way of dealing with the pandemic with the Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, and with now former US president Donald Trump, despite their different political colors.

All three, for example, have refused to wear a mask.

At the beginning of the pandemic in Brazil, Bolsonaro was widely criticized for calling COVID-19 a “little flu”, a speech that still haunts him and today resonates in the recent words of the leftist López Obrador.

Trump caught COVID-19 in October 2020 and appeared at a public event without doctors being clear if he was still contagious.

And among his many occurrences, Trump proposed injecting COVID-19 patients with disinfectant.

“All politicians evaluate the electoral consequences of their actions. And in the opinion of President López Obrador, a more restrictive policy could generate animosity, “said Khemvirg Puente, a political scientist at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), when comparing the three leaders.

Minimization of the pandemic

Mexico a few days ago exceeded four million infections and 300,000 deaths from COVID-19, being the fifth nation in the world by number of deaths.

In addition, it registered a historical record of new infections in one day.

“The omicron variant is a little covid,” López Obrador said just this Monday, when reading a series of tweets from a related journalist.

This feeling that the Mexican Executive has minimized the pandemic has lasted throughout these almost two years, according to experts.

“The Government of Mexico has been consistent with its own actions since the beginning of the pandemic. In other words, it is far from the policies and recommendations of the WHO and experts in the field, and this has brought negative consequences, ”said Puente.

Despite the contagion of López Obrador and the omicron scourge in Mexico, today the “morning” was celebrated, as every day.

There was even a video of the president – who in recent days met with a good part of the cabinet – confined and in his office.

With a somewhat hoarse voice, he claimed to have minor symptoms. “Let’s not be scared,” he remarked.

And he took his temperature and oxygenation somewhat awkwardly in front of the camera, confirming that in a presidency as mediatic as the current one, the maxim that the show must continue on a daily basis governs.