In March 2019, South American football confederation Conmebol announced that the 2021 edition of the Copa America — the continent’s leading principal international football tournament — would be jointly hosted by Colombia and Argentina. While critical of the decision, pundits were curious to see how the competition would unfold, being held at two opposite ends of the continent.
Two years on and less than two weeks before the tournament is scheduled to kick off, the prospect of a Colombia-Argentina Copa America lies in tatters, with both nations abdicating from their hosting duties amid coronavirus fears and social unrest in the former.
Left homeless and with little time to drum up an alternative solution, the prevailing opinion around the continent is that the 2021 Copa America should be canceled. However, with broadcasting and television contracts on the line, Conmebol declared that the show must go on and, on Monday morning, announced that the tournament will take place in Brazil.
However, while the coronavirus is a major concern in Colombia and Argentina, it is a waking nightmare in Brazil.
The decision was widely panned on social media in a country which has seen over 460,000 total Covid-19 deaths and where an average of more than 1,800 are still losing their lives to the virus every day.
Senator Renan Calheiros — the rapporteur of an ongoing inquiry into the federal government’s coronavirus response — called the decision to host the Copa America in Brazil a “tournament of death.” Pointing the finger at the Jair Bolsonaro administration, he said that “vaccine offers...
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