In 2021, major HMO Hapvida was at the epicenter of Brazil’s central political fact of the year, the Senate’s Covid inquiry. Senators accused the country’s largest health insurer of pushing unproven “early treatment” against the coronavirus, touted by President Jair Bolsonaro, and which included ineffective drugs such as chloroquine.
Essentially, Hapvida used patients as guinea pigs, the inquiry’s final report concluded.
At the time, The Brazilian Report revealed that the Koren family, which controls Hapvida, expanded their political ties with parties such as Progressives and Democrats — which are part of a group of rentier parties known as...