70 percent of Brazilians don’t trust coronavirus numbers

A poll by Paraná Pesquisas shows that 70 percent of Brazilians don’t trust official Covid-19 figures — 35 percent believe they are understated, while another 35 percent say tallies are inflated. Meanwhile, one out of 20 Brazilians believes the coronavirus is not even real.

Among those with a college education or above, the belief that cases are being underreported rises to 42 percent of respondents. The reverse trend occurs with those educated up to a high-school level, with 39 percent of this cohort believing official Covid-19 numbers are inflated.

Only 2 percent of the sample population with a college degree thinks the virus is not real. On the other hand, 6.3 percent of interviewees between 16 and 24 years of age think the coronavirus is a hoax, making it the biggest demographic within the 4 percent chunk of the population that denies the disease’s existence of deniers. 94 percent of Brazilians are convinced that Covid-19 is real, while 2 percent claimed to not know or preferred to not answer.

Paraná Pesquisas interviewed 2,166 people from 206 municipalities, across 26 states and the Federal District, through phone calls between June 15 and 18. The survey was done with a 95-percent confidence level and a 2-percent margin of error.

In March, The Brazilian Report wrote about the influence of coronavirus deniers in positions of power on the Brazilian population.

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