A judge in Brazil has ordered President Jair Bolsonaro to wear a protective mask when he is in public spaces in the capital, Brasilia, and the surrounding federal district.
The far-right president has been criticised for belittling the risk posed by coronavirus.
He dismissed it as “a little cold” at the start of the pandemic.
Brazil has the second-highest number of coronavirus cases and Covid-related fatalities in the world after the US.
There are more than 1.1m confirmed cases of coronavirus in Brazil and more than 51,000 coronavirus-related deaths have been recorded, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.
Despite these high figures, President Bolsonaro has repeatedly appeared in public without a mask while greeting his supporters.
A tally of figures collated by Johns Hopkins University shows that the total number of virus-related deaths in Latin America and the Caribbean is now more than 100,000.
More than half of these deaths have been reported in Brazil, where case numbers continue to be among the highest in the world, behind only the US.
Mexico has over 23,300 fatalities. Both countries have taken less severe lockdown measures than many other nations and neither has imposed nationwide restrictions.
Peru and Chile have also been badly affected, with 8,404 and 4,505 deaths respectively.
Latin America now consistently reports more daily cases than the US and Europe, and experts say the peak of the epidemic in some countries is still weeks away.
