Opening too early will destroy Brazilian businesses, including in the cachaça industry

UPDATE #2: A judge has overruled the previous suspension of the Governor’s decision.

UPDATE: Reopening in the DF has been suspended by court ruling.

The US and Brazil are letting the Coronavirus run rampant, unwilling to continue basic steps that could protect lives and ensure economic stability. This week, after several months in quarantine, the governor of the Distrito Federal, the state in which Brasilia is located, is opening everything back up: schools, stores, bars, and restaurants. The whole shebang. Anyone who has paid attention to what is going on in the world knows that Brazil has had a terrible response to the pandemic and is seeing 50,000 new cases per day.

The idea that we would reopen as this health crisis is worsening just blows my mind. If you think that the medical infrastructure is threatened by COVID-19 in the US, imagine what’s going to happen here. Everyone understands that there’s an economic toll to shutting down. But the alternative is worse: economic, health, and infrastructure collapse all at the same time. Ultimately, the economy will have to close again in order to limit the impact of the coronavirus.

As much as cachaça needs the world to open in order to do well when the rest of the economy stagnates and begins to decline, cachaça isn’t going to be able to sustain itself. Sorry, that’s the truth. We’re at a moment where stupidity could ruin the health and economic well-being of millions of people for years. The chaos of an uncoordinated response will mean that Brazil and the US, assuming they can re-establish competent leadership, will also be responding for years.

Will things change now that Bolsonaro has tested positive for COVID? Hopefully, he can learn a lesson and set the country on the right course. But I’m not going to hold my breath.