Rio de Janeiro Carnival 2022, the festival is known as the 'mecca' of Carnivals, returned yesterday for the first time since Covid-19 swept across the country.
Rio de Janeiro's mayor Eduardo Paes handed the key to the city to the symbolic Carnival 'King Momo' on April 20, Wilson Dias da Costa Neto, opening the festival.
The street parties in Rio, known as 'blocos', were not granted authorization from City Hall, but mayor Paes has said he will refrain from deploying the Municipal Guard.
'City Hall won’t impede people from being in public spaces, from celebrating, but it’s impossible that it happens at such (large) size,' Paes said in response to a reporter’s question, according to Time.
The 2022 Carnival was due to take place from Thursday 24 February until Shrove Tuesday on 1 March, with the Roman Catholic Church putting in place the tradition of the Carnival leading to Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent.
But due to the Omicron variant of Covid-19 spreading through Brazil, it was postponed by two months, taking place between the 20th and 30th of April in 2022.
Brazil saw a huge spike in Covid cases thanks to the new variant spreading throughout the country in January and February, but levels have since fallen comparable to December 2021 according to Our World in Data, which saw relatively low case levels compared to the previous 20 months.
Parades ran in 2020 but the crowds were absent due to the ongoing pandemic, with a full cancellation in 2021. Two years ago saw the first time Brazil had delayed the festival in a century.
Last year, the mayor symbolically handed the city key to health workers in lab coats, after announcing the cancellation of the carnival because of the pandemic.
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