Mediatization, post-truth, and knowledge production about Covid-19 263 very well. Good afternoon, everyone14.” In the video – watched more than 7,300,000 times and liked by 570,000 people15 – the president takes a pill of the drug and reports: “Well, here I am taking the third dose of hydroxochloroquine (sic). Hahahaha. I’m feeling really good. I was so-so on Sunday, unwell on Monday, today, Tuesday, I’m much better than Saturday. So, it’s definitely working.” Although the rhetoric that the president circulates on digital social networks recognizes that “no drug has its scien- tifically proven effectiveness [in the fight against coronavirus],” when he testifies, in the video posted on July 7, to be “one more person in which it’s working. So, I trust hydroxychloroquine. And you? Thanks, we are in this together,” Bolsonaro superim- poses his personal experience with the disease on the production of knowledge through the scientific method. In other words, the president’s body, cured by hydroxychloroquine, presents it- self as the testimonial ethos (SACRAMENTO; BORGES, 2017) of his rhetoric and, therefore, reaffirms the epistemology of the point of view by suggesting that “the knowledge produced in and through direct experimentation from the knowing subject is superior to the knowledge produced through methodological distancing” (OLIVEIRA, 2020, p. 83). The president’s drug treatment with hydroxychloroquine was then publicized on his Facebook page as evidence of the drug’s effectiveness in treating COVID-19. In this sense, Bolsonaro started posting everyday photos of his isolation at Palácio da Alvorada. On July 8, he makes a toast to the success of his treatment with a cup of coffee and declared: “To those who do not support Hydroxychloroquine, but do not present alternatives, I regret to inform you that I am very well with its use, and, with the grace of God, I will live yet for a long time16.” After 18 days of the first positive test for COVID-19, Bolsonaro shared on his Facebook page that the result of the fourth test he underwent to identify the disease caused by the new coronavirus was negative: “RT-PCR for Sars-Cov 2: nega14 Available at https://bit.ly/3hsFOmc. Accessed on September 15, 2020. 15 Data from October 17, 2021. 16 Available at https://bit.ly/3mqf3CA. Accessed on September 11, 2020.
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