LIMA, Peru—In a country long plagued by political malfeasance, jaded Peruvians like to say that they usually cast their ballot for the “least bad” candidate. Now, as Peru staggers toward an April 11 general election, voters—battered by the COVID-19 pandemic, economic collapse and five years of political turmoil—seem unable to decide which of the 18 largely unconvincing presidential candidates that might be. Yonhy Lescano, the center-left frontrunner, barely breaks into double digits in opinion polls, while the leading five candidates’ combined support does not hit 50 percent. These are unprecedentedly low numbers, even for a society that has long viewed [...]
Before a recent spike in COVID-19 cases, Chile was being lauded in the international press for its remarkable progress in vaccinating its population against the coronavirus. Soaring caseloads in recent weeks have dampened that narrative of success, but the fact remains that this small, relatively well-off Latin American nation is moving faster to inoculate its citizens than almost any other country in the world. Meanwhile, nearby Paraguay, where scarce shots generated public outrage against the government’s handling of the pandemic, has emerged in the media as a poster child of Latin America’s poor performers. Both countries share common features with [...]
LA PAZ, Bolivia—“The biggest change is a mental one,” Guido Montano, one half of Bolivia’s first-ever same-sex civil union, told me when I asked him recently how his life had changed since he and his longtime partner, David Aruquipa, won a two-year legal battle to register their union last December. “It may seem a vague idea in day-to-day life,” he said, “but I just immediately sensed that we have more rights.” That vague idea suddenly became much more real in January, when both men contracted COVID-19, forcing them to contemplate a worst-case scenario. “With David really ill, the fact that [...]
