World’s longest lockdown didn’t avoid a coronavirus disaster in Argentina

Argentina was one of the first Latin American countries to respond to the coronavirus pandemic, with the government placing the country under lockdown by March 20 — even before European countries such as Germany. And, while most of the world has already returned to some version of normalcy, around 30 percent of Argentina’s population is still adhering to restrictive measures — even if many people stopped abiding by these rules — in what is the world’s longest lockdown.

However, that hasn’t prevented a major surge in new daily coronavirus cases and deaths, with the country posting much higher figures per million people than neighbors Brazil — deemed to be Latin America’s textbook example of how not to deal with a pandemic.

How effective was the lockdown?

As our Explaining Brazil podcast discussed, having responsible...