Belarus: Masking the virus

The Documentary Podcast

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.3 • 2.6K Ratings

🗓️ 28 May 2020

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Belarus’s all-powerful President has focused global attention on his country by ostentatiously downplaying the coronavirus pandemic. Alexander Lukashenko has allowed shops, markets and restaurants and football stadiums to remain open and is encouraging people to go out to work. In early May he laid on a grand military spectacle celebrating victory in WW2, in defiance of social distancing advice. He told Belarussians they could stay healthy by drinking vodka and driving tractors in the fields and dismissed concerns over the virus as “psychosis.” But medics and bereaved families say otherwise. And with a doubling of infections every two or three days, there is not much to laugh about in Belarus. Medical staff have allegedly been sacked and even detained for speaking out about poor conditions in hospitals and the inaccurate death certificates.

Assignment explores what lies behind President Lukashenko’s position. We hear from community activists, war veterans, tech-wizards and many other diverse people in Belarus. Lucy Ash pieces it all together with reporting by Ilya Kuziatsou.

Produced by Monica Whitlock

(Image: Jana Shostak’s Angry Mask. Human Constanta, a Belarusian human rights organisation, asked eight artists to design facemasks focusing on the coronavirus pandemic. Credit: Jakub Jasiukiewicz)

Transcript

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0:00.0	Thanks for downloading this podcast from the BBC World Service.
0:04.0	It's better to die standing than on your knees.
0:07.1	So said Alexander Lukashenko at a nice hockey match
0:10.5	in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic. The Bialer Russian
0:14.7	president who's ruled with an iron fist for a quarter of a century has refused to
0:20.0	impose a lockdown and been dismissive of international efforts to contain the virus.
0:26.0	I wanted to find out why. So I'm pulling my elastic through the waistband and that's for the trousers of a three-piece outfit.
0:47.0	I'm not using zigzag here in case somebody needs to tighten it up later on.
0:55.0	It must take ages. Hello, I'm Lucy Ash and this week's assignment on the BBC World Service from Bielarous starts with a question.
1:06.4	What do a beauty queen, a biochemist and a business women have in common?
1:12.0	Well, they're all pretty nifty with a sewing machine. and are
1:12.9	all pretty nifty with a sewing machine.
1:19.6	These women in a town north of the capital Minsk are producing masks and protective suits for medics.
1:26.0	Bialer Russian hospitals, like most hospitals everywhere, were caught short by the coronavirus outbreak.
1:32.0	Svetlana, a makeup artist and former Mrs. Universe,
1:36.0	was one of the first to respond to the crisis.
1:48.0	I started sewing masks and sewing masks and giving them to friends. Nobody took it seriously. They were just laughing about and joking, but eventually people
1:56.4	started joining in.
2:01.1	Ten people began to sew with me.
2:05.0	First, we bought their special fabric in zips with our own money.
2:09.0	Then someone from a hospital brought us a roll of fabric.
2:15.8	We bought 1,000 meters of thread on the first week.
	...

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