If you turn into a crocodile: Brazilian Presidents bizarre warning against COVID-19 vaccine

Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro launched an attack on Thursday against the coronavirus vaccines, AFP reported. The President of the worst-hit Latin American nation went on to assert that Pfizer-BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine could turn people into crocodiles or bearded ladies.

“In the Pfizer contract, it’s very clear: ‘we’re not responsible for any side effects.’ If you turn into a crocodile, it’s your problem,” the far-right President said, AFP reported.

“If you become superhuman, if a woman starts to grow a beard or if a man starts to speak with an effeminate voice, they will not have anything to do with it,” he added, referring to the drug manufacturers.

The vaccine is undergoing tests in Brazil for weeks and is already being used in the United States and Britain.

Also read: Political leaders line up for early COVID-19 vaccines

Bolsonaro said that once a vaccine has been certified by Brazil’s regulatory agency Anvisa, “it will be available for everyone that wants it. But me, I won’t get vaccinated.”

“Some people say I’m giving a bad example,” Bolsonaro said.

But to the imbeciles, to the idiots that say this, I tell them I’ve already caught the virus, I have the antibodies, so why get vaccinated?” he added.

The President had contracted the novel coronavirus in July and recovered within three weeks.

There have been a small number of cases of apparent reinfection although there is no certainty over whether a person can be reinfected or how long immunity lasts.

While launching the immunization campaign on Wednesday, Bolsonaro said the vaccine will be free but not compulsory. 

The country’s Supreme Court on Thursday, however, ruled that the vaccine will be obligatory. That means authorities can fine people for not being vaccinated and ban them from certain public spaces, but not force them to take it.

Also read: Jair Bolsonaro’s Brazil vaccination plan faces scathing criticism

Brazil is the worst-hit Latin American nation and the third worst-affected in the world. It has recorded 7,162,978 COVID-19 cases and 185,650 deaths, according to the tally by Johns Hopkins University.

Brazil is in the middle of a second wave of coronavirus infections.

After peaking in June to August cases had been dropping but that changed in November.

On Thursday, Brazil surpassed 1,000 daily deaths from COVID-19 for the first time since September.