Caruaru

In October, at least 25 prisoners were killed in a jail in Boa Vista, in Roraima state, and seven youths also died in a riot in Caruaru in Pernambuco state.

"Everybody says he has a small head, but I don't know what's going on," Ferreira, a 38-year-old maid, told me while she waited in Caruaru, a city in northeast Brazil near Recife, where the Zika virus has hit hardest.

“Everybody says he has a small head, but I don’t know what’s going on,” Ferreira, a 38-year-old maid, told me while she waited in Caruaru, a city in northeast Brazil near Recife, where the Zika virus has hit hardest.

At the far reaches of that radius is Caruaru, a sprawling, low-slung city of 350,000 where newly paved streets wind among walls of exposed cinder block.

Caruaru's hotels seem blithe about the Confederations Cup.