COVID-19: How coronavirus is affecting indigenous people in the Amazon

By Stabroek News On In Business |
A member of the 35,000-strong Yanomami Tribe, became the first known indigenous person from the Amazon to die from COVID-19.
A member of the 35,000-strong Yanomami Tribe, became the first known indigenous person from the Amazon to die from COVID-19.

By Nina Moeller

Associate Professor, Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience, Coventry University JM Pedersen Honorary Research Fellow, Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience, Coventry University Reproduced from World Economic Forum April 29th, 2020

There are growing fears that COVID-19 may wreak havoc in the Amazon. A 15-year-old boy from the Yanomami tribe became the first known indigenous person to die from the disease. Due to the individual and varied nature of the tribes, finding a way to help indigenous communities is proving hard, as each tribe is unique and therefore needs a different response.

This fear is unsurprising, given that an estimated 90% of the original inhabitants of the Americas died as a result of European colonisation, especially through the infectious diseases Europeans brought with them. Fragmented collective memories of deadly pandemics from the time of distant ancestors still circulate in stories of magical deaths caused by foreigners.