Brazil’s Covid-19 socialite superspreaders

The first Covid-19 death in the state of Rio de Janeiro was 63-year-old Cleonice Gonçalves, a maid who worked for a wealthy family in the upmarket Rio neighborhood of Leblon. State officials say Ms. Gonçalves contracted the virus from her employer, who had been holidaying in Italy and fell ill on return but allegedly refused to inform her housekeeper of the risk of contamination.

On Monday, March 16, Ms. Gonçalves began showing Covid-19 symptoms while at work. She then took a two-hour taxi back to her home in Miguel Pereira — a countryside town north of Rio de Janeiro. Diabetic and with a history of high blood pressure, Ms. Gonçalves died the following afternoon.

Beyond illustrating the unequal and often servile relationship between Brazil’s socioeconomic classes, the case of Ms. Gonçalves also serves to highlight that the main vectors of the coronavirus in Brazil — which originated in China and quickly found a new epicenter in Italy — is the country’s well-traveled high society.

Socialite superspreaders

Speaking to newspaper Folha de S. Paulo, a member of the exclusive Rio de Janeiro Country Club mused that the novel coronavirus was brought to Brazil by the “jet-set elite.”

“It came from abroad and spread very quickly around our circles,” said the country club member...