Indigenous call for emergency fund to tackle coronavirus

Indigenous leaders in Brazil on Monday (May 4) asked the World Health Organization (WHO) for the creation of an emergency fund to help protect their communities from the threat of the coronavirus pandemic.

Many of the 850 thousand indigenous people in the country live in remote areas in the Amazon, with limited access to health services, and indigenous groups say the government does not include their communities in the national plans to combat the virus.

In a letter to WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, they ask for help obtaining personal protection equipment currently not available to health agents working in reserves and villages.

“It is a true emergency,” representative Joenia Wapichana told Reuters. Wapichana is led the initiative to send the letter and the first woman to become a Congress member in Brazil.

“Indigenous people are vulnerable and have no protection”, she stated.

Joenia Wapichana is led the initiative to send the letter and the first woman to become a Congress member in Brazil - Marcelo Camargo/Agência Brasil

The number of Brazilian indigenous people killed by the virus went up to 18, according to indigenous association APIB, but government figures indicate six, as it does not include the deaths of indigenous people living in urban areas.

On Sunday (3), it had been confirmed that 107 indigenous people in the Amazon were infected, 59 of them in the extreme north of the Amazon river, near the borders with Colombia and Peru, APIB reported.

The Coordination of Indigenous Organizations of the Brazilian Amazon (COIAB) complained about the lack of tests and the absence of government assistance for people living out of traditional villages, in cities like Manaus, state capital of Amazonas, where COVID-19 cases are have been overwhelming hospitals.

New Health Minister Nelson Teich said that protecting indigenous people is a priority. The National Indian Foundation (Funai) banned Christian missionaries from converting isolated tribes during the pandemic, in order to prevent contagion.

The appeal of indigenous groups comes one day after an open letter was sent by dozens of international artists, musicians, and actors urging Bolsonaro to protect the native people of Brazil.

Among the artists who signed the letter are Ai Weiwei and David Hockney, musicians Sting and Paul McCartney, actors Glenn Close and Sylvester Stallone, and hostess and actress Oprah Winfrey.