The Myth of 'the Careless Mexican Government': US Media Continue to Pandemic-Shame Mexico's Center-Left President

By DAVID SCHMIDT

When I contracted COVID-19 in January of this year, my first thought was: Thank God I’m in Mexico City.

Once I experienced symptoms, I quickly received a swab and tested positive. In addition to the countless private pharmacies and testing facilities, abundant public testing centers existed across the city. After an online medical consultation, I called the pharmacy and requested a home delivery of medication and vitamins. My physician gave me instructions for monitoring blood oxygen levels and heart rate, to ensure that I wouldn’t require further intervention. (Thankfully, I didn’t.)

While the virus continued to spread in Mexico City — as it did in nearly every densely populated city on Earth — Mexico’s federal government has been engaged in a full-frontal attack against the pandemic over the past year.

The administration of center-left president Andrés Manuel López Obrador (known by the acronym AMLO) implemented a nationwide strategy to detect focal points of contagion. Based on levels of hospitalizations and new cases, regions were subjected to progressive degrees of shut-down, classified according to a system of “traffic lights” (red being the most restrictive). During the winter months of increased contagion, public health service vehicles regularly circled the streets of Mexico City, with loudspeakers broadcasting reminders of quarantine regulations.

The civilian population rose to the challenge. The streets of Mexico City became a sea of face masks, with hand sanitizer available at nearly any shop or public transit station. Even the most humble shops and markets followed standard procedure for all customers: temperature taken at the door, mandatory hand sanitizer, shoes disinfected on a rubber mat with chlorine. All things considered, I observed more precautions in Mexico over the past year than in much of the United States.

Mexico’s government entered a new phase in the fight on Christmas Eve 2020, when they launched an ambitious, nationwide vaccination campaign. The plan is to vaccinate the entire population of 117 million free of charge. Despite all these measures, however, much of the English-language media continues to paint a very different picture of Mexico.

I wrote about this tendency in a previous article for The Progressive Populist (Has Mexico Dropped the Ball on COVID-19? 5/15/20.) A year later, the media continue to repeat the same chorus: “AMLO is reckless and irresponsible, and refuses to take COVID-19 seriously.”

This trend is exemplified in a recent story from NPR: “Mexico’s President Has Been Muddying The Country’s COVID-19 Vaccine Messaging” (April 20, 2021). The interview with reporter Carrie Kahn begins with the statement: “After weeks of hemming and hawing, Mexico’s president finally got a COVID-19 vaccine today; this after repeatedly downplaying the virus and shunning lockdowns.”

Much of the US corporate media has followed this same tone. The most frequently repeated claims are worth addressing in detail.

1) “AMLO is not taking the virus seriously”

In fact, the government has been fighting the pandemic head-on for the past year, culminating in its nationwide vaccination campaign. AMLO’s administration has signed agreements to purchase over 234 million doses of the vaccine, from five different sources: AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Sputnik V, Sinovac, and CanSino.

Health authorities have communicated with a dozen other laboratories to further diversify their options, while Mexico takes steps toward producing vaccines in-country. To date, some 12 million citizens have received at least one vaccine, including 973,000 health care workers.

Hardly the actions of a COVID-denier.

2) “Mexico’s vaccination lags behind the rest of the world”

Mexico’s current vaccination rate is 9%, in comparison with 31% in the United States. The NPR report bemoans the fact that many wealthier Mexicans are coming to the US to get their vaccine, reinforcing a very old trope: “We do things right here, the American way.”

In fact, Mexico’s current vaccination rate is impressive, considering the vast socioeconomic disparities between the two nations. Furthermore, they have managed to achieve this with an already strained public health system, gutted by previous neoliberal governments. Many Latin American countries lag far behind Mexico, including the long-time US ally, Colombia (5.82%). Mexico is even ahead of Costa Rica, the stable and prosperous “Switzerland of Central America” (8.85%).

3) “AMLO resists mask mandates”

Actually, mask mandates exist all over Mexico. What AMLO has resisted is the criminalization of the issue, opting for a campaign of education rather than using the police to enforce mandates. In a country that is still mourning the 250,000 dead from President Calderón’s drug war, the last thing anyone needs is more criminalization.

Even so, local-level mask mandates have sometimes led to state violence. In May 2020, a man in the State of Jalisco was detained by police for failing to wear a mask; he was beaten in custody and died, sparking widespread protests. This is precisely what the federal administration hopes to avoid: dragging criminal law enforcement into the matter.

4) “AMLO refused to shut down the economy”

Yes, he certainly did. Mexico is a country where half of the population still depends on the informal economy, working hand-to-mouth. Forcing millions of workers to stay at home without pay would likely start a civil war, one that would kill more people than the coronavirus ever could.

Why does the media insist on the “irresponsible AMLO” story, then? One side comment by the NPR reporter Kahn is quite revealing: “Lopez Obrador blames a lot of Mexico’s problems on ... what he calls ‘neoliberal economic policies’ of past administrations.” She then dismissively states, “That has a long shelf life here for many in Mexico.”

The suggestion seems to be that it is unreasonable for AMLO to do so. However, the fact remains that Mexico’s previous administrations did enact neoliberal policies. This is not a word that AMLO invented, nor is it a subjective judgement: it’s a clear term with a concrete definition. AMLO is the first president to make a break with those policies—and that’s what worries some policymakers and ideologues in the States.

Many are already expressing their concern about whether or not AMLO will be willing to follow Washington’s lead in international affairs. Critics question his foreign policy of non-intervention, respecting the self-determination of other nations; the implicit fear is that if Washington decides to intervene in the affairs of a Latin American nation, Mexico might not follow suit.

It should be noted that the tone of US corporate media is identical to the right-wing media in Mexico. Conservative journalists and intellectuals pine for the “good old days” of Mexico’s previous administrations, when predatory capitalism flourished unfettered. Some of them openly express admiration for recent coups in other Latin American countries, like Bolivia, making less-than-subtle suggestions that the same could happen in Mexico.

As a center-left president who challenges US hegemony in the region, AMLO will continue to incur the wrath of pro-Washington voices long after Mexico’s population has been vaccinated. And, although not all US journalists have geopolitics in mind when covering the pandemic in Mexico, their reporting can still fall into old patterns, adopting a paternalistic tone regarding their southern neighbor.

As we all move towards the “new normal” of the post-pandemic world, it is high time for us to move beyond those old patterns.

David J. Schmidt is an author, podcaster, multilingual translator, and homebrewer who splits his time between Mexico City and San Diego, Calif. He is a proponent of fair and alternative forms of trade. Twitter: @SchmidtTales

From The Progressive Populist, June 1, 2021

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