Blog: South America

Brazil’s densely packed favelas brace for coronavirus: ‘It will kill a lot of people.’

Brazil's favelas are extremely dense with people, making the common practice supported in the US, social distancing, not possible to combat the spread of COVID-19. Experts are not able to provide a solution so much as determine that many many people who live in these portions of the country will die. Population Density is a concept that is greatly at play here, as social distancing relies on a fairly average population density, and in a place such as a favela, population density is extremely high. At this time, it's not a matter of how badly the nearly one fourth of Brazil's population that lives in favelas will be hit, it's a matter of when.