Brazil's Lula Says Asked Putin To Ignore Bolsonaro's Controversial Vaccine Claims

Fahad Shabbir (@FahadShabbir) Published March 26, 2021 | 08:17 PM

Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, a former president of Brazil, has criticized the country's current leader, Jair Bolsonaro, for making light of the coronavirus pandemic and mentioned asking Russian President Vladimir Putin to disregard Bolsonaro's position on vaccination if the South American country turns to Moscow for Sputnik V

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 26th March, 2021) Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, a former president of Brazil, has criticized the country's current leader, Jair Bolsonaro, for making light of the coronavirus pandemic and mentioned asking Russian President Vladimir Putin to disregard Bolsonaro's position on vaccination if the South American country turns to Moscow for Sputnik V.

Bolsonaro has notoriously denied the treat of COVID-19, calling it a flu and refusing to wear a mask while appearing in public. The Brazilian president has reportedly claimed that the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine would "turn one into a crocodile," while his supporters are said to have spread conspiracy theories about the Chinese vaccine being used to implant microchips.

"Bolsonaro and his supporters have spread information on the internet that the Chinese vaccine is used to implant a chip into people, and the BioNTech vaccine is capable of turning people into crocodiles.

These are the kind of lies we have to fight against," Lula said in an interview with Der Spiegel, adding that he asked Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping to ignore Bolsonaro's words if the country makes a request for vaccines.

The former Brazilian leader also mentioned meeting with a representative of the Russian fund responsible for promoting Sputnik V.

Lula added that Bolsonaro does not believe in vaccination and "spent a fortune on a drug called hydroxychloroquine, which is proved to be useless."

"On Tuesday, 3,158 people died from COVID-19 in Brazil. This is the biggest genocide in our history," Lula stated, saying that it is necessary to "save Brazil from COVID-19."

Brazil has one of the largest numbers of COVID-19 cases across the globe, with a total of over 12 million cases, including more than 300,000 fatalities.