[mlcruz]

A little bit more context:

Rio de Janeiro is by far the most corrupt Brazilian state. Its hard to explain how bad it is if you are not Brazilian, but imagine that every single former state governor and many of the mayors have been sent to prison for corruption after their term ended.

So what usually happens is that someone from the public sector opens up a public bidding for some service to be done by the private sector, and usually who wins is someone who has ties with the local government.

Most of the time whoever wins the bid (usually some shell company) is going to barely offer the service, and share most of the profits with their associates in the local gov.

This is one of such cases: The private lab doing the tests is owned by the cousin of the former state secretary of health Dr.Luizinho. Its very likely that they just did not do the tests at all (yes, that how bad it is)

Just another normal day in Rio de Janeiro.

[wslh]

Interesting perspective on the impact of corruption across different countries. It's striking how two countries with similar levels of corruption can have vastly different outcomes in specific areas. Take Argentina as an example: while it's highly corrupt, organ transplants are remarkably well-organized under a single entity, INCUCAI [1]. You can even see crystal clear stats there.

[1] https://www.argentina.gob.ar/salud/incucai

[DanielHB]

Corruption is not a single axis, for example college entrance exams and voting in brazil are very trustworthy in my opinion.

Institutions are corrupt, not a whole country. Sure there is some level of infection between institutions but there is still a lot of a single one can do.

[forinti]

One thing you don't see in Brazil is traffic police or bureaucrats asking for petty bribes, something which is quite common in neighbouring countries.

Corruption is a problem for sure, but I think incompetence and lack of initiative are far worse issues in the Brazilian executive.

[tarruda]

> voting in brazil are very trustworthy

How can a closed system that cannot be audited be considered trustworthy? After the voting happens, there's no physical proof of the vote.

Highly recommend reading this: https://dfaranha.github.io/project/evoting/

[matheusmoreira]

Because the supreme court judge has decreed that the voting machines are UNQUESTIONABLE. That's all there is to it. Not even our elected representatives get to doubt these things:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36543423

Fun fact: brazilians commonly express feelings of superiority towards civilized developed world nations because of these voting machines. They think americans, germans and everyone else in the world are living in the literal stone age due to their "archaic" voting processes just because it takes time to count the votes.

[vitorgrs]

Brazil is way more decentralized in that way, especially health care, so health care quality will greatly change depending on your city even.

That said, organ transplants in Brazil are managed by the Federal Government (lists, etc), but the clinics and hospitals will usually be state or city made...

Brazil is pretty good at organ transplants, surprisingly.

[elzbardico]

Rio de Janeiro is corrupt, but it is far from the most corrupt in relative terms. Contrary to popular perception is not even one of the most violent.

[RcouF1uZ4gsC]

> but imagine that every single former state governor and many of the mayors have been sent to prison for corruption after their term ended

Sounds similar to Illinois

[unobatbayar]

Similarly to the Mongolian government, except that only major cases are targeted, and instead of the actual culprits, people who were just doing their jobs under them end up in prison. Case closed.

[namaria]

I usually direct people to watch the movies Elite Squad 1 and 2. They're entertaining and pretty much explain why Rio is so violent and so corrupt and how both things feed off each other.

[xrd]

Incredible movie. And, the backstory is incredible as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elite_Squad

[matheusmoreira]

I'd like to note that Brazil is not at all unique in being corrupt or even in the methods used. For example, watch HBO's The Wire and you'll find the police and politicians playing the exact same numbers game. It seems to be inherent to democracy, a side effect of reelection.

The films do a wondeful job depicting the poverty of Brazil, and the way it attracts people to organized crime. It attracts so many of them, they form a nation unto themselves. Complete with their own army, territory, laws, tribunals... It gets to the point it's a silent secession.

[namaria]

Not uniquely corrupt but uniquely violent (before the Ukraine invasion one in eight violent homicides happened in Brazil... not South America, Brazil).

Besides, I don't know great movies that explain the corruption and violence on each metropolis, just this one (and The Wire for Baltimore, which is by the way great television).

I'd recommend also watching the Vice piece on how Brazilian gangs are fueling violence in Paraguay. It's quite jarring to see the slang of street criminals of Rio and SP spoken across the border in what is a war like situation.

[marcosdumay]

> Its hard to explain how bad it is if you are not Brazilian

It's hard to explain to most Brazilians too.

People go there expecting the worst. I don't think I've met anyone that wasn't still surprised.

[Synaesthesia]

Huh, as a South African, now I'm quite intrigued to visit it.

[xrd]

Tangentially related, but when i lived in Rio I would always tell people I thought it was the most beautiful city in the world. Then, a visiting exec asked me: "Well, have you been to Cape Town?"

[marcosdumay]

As a tourist you won't get yourself in situations like people throwing threats at you because you obeyed traffic laws.

[blackeyeblitzar]

How free do people feel to speak up against corruption? Like could they go public on Twitter/X and call out the issues they see? Or would they face legal retribution or physical violence?

[luizcdc]

It really depends. Locally, factions like criminal associations and retired cops mafias (militias), who always have city councelors and mayors in their pockets, may retaliate if someone with an audience is being too annoying (see Marielle Franco's case).

Nationally, not all politicians enjoy any protection from the supreme court against critiscism, only the best connected ones and the supreme court itself. Recently, a former YouTuber who lost all his social accounts and had to self-exile to the US for some disrespectful comments against the supreme court was sentenced to 1.5 years in jail for calling the newest supreme court judge a "fatty".

Except for the supreme court itself, the average Brazilian can voice their concerns and speak up against corruption with very low chances of repercussions if they don't display wholly anti-democratic discourse, like wishing the military to execute a coup.

[vitorgrs]

About the "fatty" one... This is more how richer/powerful people have more resources to sue. The case would be a clearly win for everyone who sue it.

Brazil's penal code criminalize any "Injury" and "defemation"

> Art. 139 - To defame someone, attributing to them a fact that is offensive to their reputation:

> Penalty - detention from three months to one year, and a fine.

> Art. 140 - To insult someone, offending their dignity or decency:

> Penalty - detention from one to six months, or a fine.

[rbanffy]

> a former YouTuber

Remember he also committed the crime, live, on YouTube, of advocating for the creation of a Nazi party.

[matheusmoreira]

Thought crime, huh.

He merely observed that the extreme left has a lot more space in politics than the extreme right. Why is it that nazism is banned while we have so many literal proud self-admitted socialists and communists in this country who not only walk this soil completely unpunished but also form organized parties, get elected, get appointed to the supreme court? The judge who held him guilty for calling him a "fatty" is the perfect example of one.

Anti-nazism laws are unconstitutional. Constitution says that "any and all" censorship of political nature is prohibited. Nazism is a political party. Therefore censorship of nazism is prohibited. It's that simple.

So why is it that nazism is literal thought crime while socialism and communism, far more harmful ideologies, are allowed to flourish with complete impunity? If they're gonna ban nazis, I demand that they also ban communists and socialists. It should be a literal thought crime to advocate for anything related to that nonsense. And any form of socialist organization should get all involved sent straight to jail.

That's the point that was made. Allowing that crap while simultaneously banning nazism is a contradiction. His only "crime" here was trying to resolve the contradiction by arguing that nazis should be allowed to organize. That's not what we really want. What we actually want is these socialists and communists in jail.

[rbanffy]

> Anti-nazism laws are unconstitutional. Constitution says that "any and all" censorship of political nature is prohibited. Nazism is a political party. Therefore censorship of nazism is prohibited. It's that simple.

There’s no censorship. You are allowed to say your mind and nobody can prevent you from doing it. Freedom to do something doesn’t imply impunity for committing crimes in the process of expressing your political beliefs.

> the extreme left

Brazil had a far-right president for four years. There’s zero far-left in mainstream politics in Brazil, unless you slide the Overton window so far to the right social democrats (such as PT) looks far-left and Bolsonaro looks like a moderate right-winger.

[matheusmoreira]

> There’s no censorship.

> Freedom to do something doesn’t imply impunity for committing crimes in the process of expressing your political beliefs.

Those two statements contradict each other. One can't criminalize political beliefs and simultaneously claim that there is no censorship of political beliefs.

The man had his social media presence blocked for his wrongthink. That is censorship.

> There’s zero far-left in mainstream politics in Brazil

There must be dozens of political parties with communism and socialism right in the name. Not social-democracy, not social-anything. Straight up socialist and communist parties. Why is this allowed?

And it's not just the names either, as is often claimed. They are very much socialists in their proposals and public policies. Why are these ideas allowed to spread and proliferate?

[dudus]

Freedom of expression is guaranteed in Brazil. In general people feel free to speak and that hasn't changed.

What has become a crime is the spread of misinformation in the form of fake news. For the most part these are still legislated fairly IMHO. But the precedent feels a bit dangerous

[matheusmoreira]

There are zero laws against "fake news" currently in effect in Brazil. One was proposed and Google even campaigned against it but it has yet to pass.

[HideousKojima]

See the recent spat between the Brazilian supreme court and Twitter for your answer there