White Medical Coat and the “Covidian Dragon”: early treatment alliances

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has challenged several nations around the world to develop regulatory mechanisms to contain the spread of contamination. In some of these situations, the governments bet on controversial strategies, without scientific evidence, with a view to maintaining or increasing their popularity in the midst of the health crisis. This is the case in Brazil, where the country’s president invested in a drug kit - with no proven efficacy - in an association with groups of doctors and military personnel who are at the base of his government. In this article we analyze the conditions and the social bases for the possibility of this alliance between doctors and the Bolsonaro government around what was called “early treatment”. The analysis demonstrated that this alliance depended, on the one hand, on a set of transformations in the power relations in the political system and on the ties and relationships of the medical class with the right-wing and the far right. On the other hand, certain characteristics of the professional group itself with regard to recruitment, modalities of association and their alliances with bolsonarism. The flag of “early treatment” was presented to this group as an essential resource to boost the popularity of the president and themselves, allowing his insertion in the politics and increasing the politicization of the profession.