Letter to the members of the COVID-19 Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry (CPI)

Brazil this week surpassed the milestone of 390,000 deaths from COVID-19. Taking the whole world into account, only the USA surpasses this sorrowful national record. Even if we could now stop the spread and, consequently, the sickness of thousands of Brazilians, which is far from being true, what has happened here since March 11, 2020, when the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the existence of a world pandemic, will go down in history. We will have to answer to our descendants why we let this happen; why thousands of deaths could have been avoided, but were not; and why, after all, millions of people were condemned to live with after-effects. It, therefore, rests on the shoulders of the members of the COVID-19 Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry (CPI) to determine the responsibilities that will henceforth be engraved in the memory of this country.

From the outset, we hope that the work of the senators in the investigations that are now beginning will help to reorganize the state in order to gain control over the spread of the virus on Brazilian soil as soon as possible. As has been repeated by many reputable institutions over the past year, mass vaccination and testing, social distancing, and the use of masks and alcohol gels can significantly reduce the transmission of the virus. This is already being verified in some parts of the world. Therefore, although we have no direct attribution in this regard, we believe that the mechanism of the Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry will help to reverse the irrationality that has taken hold of the federal government.

Whether for one reason or another, we have come here, as an organization of Brazilian civil society, to demand that our representatives in the Senate of the Republic adopt the posture that is expected of them in this critical time.

Above partisan considerations, it is a matter of institutions fulfilling the roles assigned to them according to the constitutional order. In this case, that of severe, rigorous, and complete oversight of the responsibilities for the tragedy that has befallen the people. Remembering that it is on the less favored strata of society, whose human rights are always trampled upon, that the greatest burden of contagion and death has fallen.

The Senate of the Republic is one of the main power branches of the State. If it bows down to the current government, democracy will lose a fundamental instrument of inspection and control. In the Chamber of Deputies, more than one hundred requests for the impeachment of the president of the Republic are awaiting a ruling from the President of the Chamber, which is his constitutional duty. Ignoring such requests, as a way of preventing them from being processed, whatever the pretext, does not strengthen our democratic state. Therefore, while paralysis takes hold of the so-called House of the People, it is hoped that the Senate, through the COVID-19 CPI, will be able to set in motion the balancing mechanisms established in the 1988 Constitution.

The scandal of thousands of daily deaths by COVID-19 cannot continue, nor can it remain in silence. The delay in the purchase of vaccines, combined with negationist speeches that never cease to cause the increase in contamination, points inexorably to the accumulation of deaths. On behalf of those we have lost and those we can preserve, we hope that the senators spare no effort and courage.