Amid Brazil’s COVID chaos, socialist Marica forges different path

Located just 60km from Rio de Janeiro, Marica has modelled itself into a very different city, paying residents a universal basic income, using its own digital currency and procuring its own vaccines.

Marica, Brazil — More than a year into the COVID-19 pandemic, Brazil seems set on beating its own tragic records on a daily basis. By April, 4,000 Brazilians were dying every 24 hours — an average of one every 20 seconds — and many while waiting for beds in overcrowded intensive care units. Hundreds of hospitals were running out of intubation kits in what the country’s leading health institution, the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), called the worst “sanitary collapse” in Brazilian history. Right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro put a new health minister in charge in March — the country’s fourth since the pandemic began. But Bolsonaro continued to criticise governors and mayors who imposed restrictive measures to stop the deadly outbreak, saying the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 “had come to stay” and that lockdowns and curfews would only impoverish Brazil.