Brazil's Bolsonaro isolated, weakened by coronavirus denial

At a tense cabinet meeting on Saturday in the Brazilian president's official residence, Jair Bolsonaro found himself isolated. The far-right leader convened the emergency meeting in Brasilia's modernist Alvorada Palace to resolve a dispute with Health Minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta, who publicly opposed the president's calls to loosen quarantine restrictions for Brazil's 210 million people. Elected two years ago on a promise to revive growth, Bolsonaro has shocked health experts around the world by persistently playing down the gravity of the epidemic, calling COVID-19 "a little cold" exaggerated by the media and his opponents - even after his political idol U.S. President Donald Trump walked back his own skepticism about the outbreak.

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