Coronavirus Update #1

Hi friends. We appreciate everyone who has checked in, and also everyone who has not checked in but are thinking of us – responding to everyone would be overwhelming when we are already overwhelmed with news and decisions. Every Fulbright program in every country (and there are usually multiple per country; I think 4 different ones in Brazil) has different recommendations and guidelines based on various factors. Fulbright and the State Department are recommending, but not requiring, that people in my program in Brazil return, so we had to decide and notify them of our decision by today.

At this time, we are not planning to come home. There are so many good reasons both to come home and to stay here. The main factors for us are that the risk of infection is much lower in Brazil right now than in the US, and that we can still get home if we need to. If either of those change, or anything else significant changes, we will reassess. That being said, we did change our flights from November to Friday. I feel more at ease that we at least have a short-term return plan, even if we will rebook at that point for later.

Brazil’s confirmed case count is at 200 as of today. We are hoping to wait it out a little longer to see what happens. Things are starting to close down but people are still not distancing as they should if they were to take lessons learned from places like the US. Still, we are hopeful, and conditions for our social limiting are very good here at the moment. There is plenty of access to food and other supplies, and the weather is fantastic so we have been incorporating more walks and runs as part of our self-care. We live in a suburban-feeling part of the city and are able to avoid people most of the time. We’ll keep you posted! In the meantime, enjoy a picture of this pretty sunset from the other night, and be well!