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Rio Will Not Postpone Carnival Celebrations to July After All

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by Eben Diskin Jan 22, 2021

All of our favorite events have either been canceled or postponed in the past year so we shouldn’t be too surprised that Brazil’s famous Carnival, which was supposed to take place in February 2021, and was then moved to July, will not take place at all this summer.

According to Reuters, Eduardo Paes, Rio de Janeiro’s new mayor, said on Thursday that he doesn’t think the city will be able to host the legendary celebration in July due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the country’s slow roll-out of the vaccine.

He wrote on Twitter, “It makes no sense to me to think at this point that we will be able to hold carnival in July. I would like to inform you that we will not have carnival in the middle of the year in 2021.”

Back in September, Rio’s 13 samba schools announced that the samba school competition would be pushed back, and did not give a new date for the celebrations.

A version of this article was previously published on September 25, 2020, and was updated on January 22, 2021, with more information.

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