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São Paulo and Rio postpone Carnival parades for Tiradentes holiday

The mayors of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro decided to postpone the samba school parades until the Tiradentes holiday, on April 21. The decision was made after a joint virtual meeting this Friday (21).

The parades of the samba schools of the special group of the capital of São Paulo were scheduled, until then, for the 25th and 26th of February. In Rio, they would be held on the 27th and 28th of the same month.

The increase in cases and hospitalizations for Covid-19 in both capitals was the main reason for changing the date.

In a press conference, it was informed that the parades will be postponed to the Tiradentes holiday, but the street Carnival remains suspended.

“From the beginning, it was agreed that we would make a joint decision. There will be no different scenario in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo”, declared the mayor of São Paulo, Ricardo Nunes (MDB), to the CNN previously.

Rio’s municipal health secretary, Daniel Soranz, said that it is a difficult decision, but that “there are no sanitary conditions for Carnival to be held on the scheduled date. April is much safer, it is difficult for the Omicron variant to advance there. There is no possibility of having Carnival at any cost”.

The secretary of health of São Paulo, Edson Aparecido, explained that it is possible to carry out a sanitary control of the public in the sambadromes and, thus, reduce the possibility of contagion.

The health departments will still define, based on the epidemiological situation of the period close to the new date of Carnival, whether a protocol will be necessary or not.

“We would never be happy to put people at risk,” said Sidnei Carrioulo, president of the Independent League of Samba Schools in São Paulo, adding that the move was “right.”

In a note, the Independent League of Samba Schools (Liesa) of Rio de Janeiro said that this scenario was already foreseen and that the decision taken was “prudent”. They also informed that all tickets already purchased for the parades will be valid for the new date.

The order of the parades and schedules will be the same in the state capital.

The League of Schools of São Paulo stated, also in a note, that it supports the decision of the city halls.

In an interview with CNN (see below), Rio Mayor Eduardo Paes (PSD) said details such as the Street Carnival are yet to be worked out.

Paes recognized the importance of the party for the economy of cities and said that the damage could be avoided by holding it on another date.

At the beginning of January, the municipal administrations of São Paulo and Rio took similar decisions by canceling the street blocks and maintaining, depending on the epidemiological situation, the samba school parades in the sambadromes with sanitary measures such as reduction of public and obligation to use of masks for public and allegories.

Read the joint note from the prefectures

The city halls of Rio and São Paulo, under the guidance of their health secretaries, chose to postpone the holding of the Samba Schools parades until the Tiradentes holiday weekend, in April. The decision was taken in respect of the current situation of the Covid-19 pandemic in Brazil and the need, at this time, to preserve lives and join forces to boost vaccination throughout the national territory.

The postponement of the carnival was decided after a meeting on Friday night, by videoconference, in which the mayor of Rio de Janeiro, Eduardo Paes, the mayor of São Paulo, Ricardo Nunes, the secretary of Health from Rio de Janeiro, Daniel Soranz, were present. the São Paulo Health Secretary Edson Aparecido, in addition to the presidents of the Samba School Leagues in both cities.

More information about the new carnival schedule will be released in due course.

See guidelines from the Ministry of Health in case of a positive diagnosis for Covid

Reference: CNN Brasil

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