The health system was collapsed. We had a very, very hard situation at the beginning of January.

I think it might happen in other places. I think we are just seeing the first ones.

Science is the only thing that we can use against such an important enemy like these ones.

You're listening to Epidemic, the podcast about the science, public health, and social impacts of the coronavirus pandemic.

I'm your host, Dr. Celine Gounder.

The pandemic has hit Brazil worse than most. After the United States, Brazil has the highest number of reported coronavirus cases in the Western Hemisphere.

And the hardest hit city in Brazil is Manaus.

It's the capital of the state of Amazonas, and it has become an example of the failure Brazil has to cope with COVID-19.

Medical staff describe an overwhelming health crisis. They lack protective gear and medical equipment and intensive care units have run out of beds.

In Manaus, cemetery workers could not dig graves fast enough.

Manaus is a city of two million in the middle of the Amazon rainforest. It sits at the confluence of the Amazon and Negro rivers.

Manaus is like an island because we have the forest on the side and also a big river on the other side.

That's Felipe Gomez Naveca, the jungle is visible across the city, and you can hear the birds through the window of Felipe's office.

I don't know in English, but in Brazil we call it Padau, that are a lot of those birds nearby.

Felipe is a public health researcher and virologist in Manaus.

He's been studying the spread and impact of SARS-CoV-2 in Amazonas.

That's the Brazilian state where Manaus is located.

During the first wave of the pandemic, Manaus was hit really hard. Some of the most dramatic images from that time were from the cemeteries.

Fields of freshly plowed earth covered in crosses, marking the graves of COVID victims.

The virus claimed lives from all over the city.

There are at least four people from my team, last oral mother or an uncle or father.

Felipe was one of them too.

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