- Roiti Metuktire

UPDATE

We continue to provide emergency relief to the peoples of the Xingu. Thanks to our own fundraising and a generous grant from our friends at Rainforest Concern we have sent over £20,000 in emergency grants, saving lives and relieving hunger and suffering.

We have helped them to protect their villages. They have established systems to purchase and deliver essential goods and equipment using sanitary hygiene, PPE and distancing, so that the villages are receiving tools and supplies safely, without the need for anyone to visit the towns. They are keeping themselves isolated and have reduced the threat of infection to an absolute minimum. They have been preparing land and planting the crops they will need to feed themselves in the coming months, and making arrangements to isolate anyone who does catch the disease.

On-going Need

But they still need our help. Until the crops are ready to harvest they still need supplies from outside to supplement their hunting and their existing crops. They need to continue to develop infrastructure and systems to keep themselves safe. And they need to be prepared with contingency plans in case the infection does reach them.

So we are asking you to do two things:

1. Make a Donation - it doesn't matter how much, every penny helps

2. Ask your friends to do the same - spread the word

Infections in Some Villages

Not all of the villages we work with have been successful in keeping the virus out. There are now at least ten villages in the eastern Xingu with cases of Covid-19, who now need additional medical help. We have made a grant to Associação Floresta Protegida to help them purchase medical equipment and supplies, ready to be transported to any village where the infection takes hold. The cost of the equipment they need is high and our first grant, while important, covers only a small part of what they need. But with your help we can make further grants - and save many more lives.

Impact of Coronavirus

On a positive note, our greatest worry - that the virus would spread very quickly through the communities, with a high mortality rate - has not happened so far. Although the death rate for indigenous people who catch Covid-19 is double what it is in the mainstream Brazilian population, so far it has not wiped out entire communities.

But indigenous people are dying. We have received news that three important leaders have succumbed: Chief Bep Karoti Xicrin, Chief José Carlos Ferreira Arara and the indefatigable Kayapó leader Bepkororoti 'Paulinho' Payakan, who led the fight for the recognition of indigenous rights in the 1980s. We knew all three - we have known Payakan for over three decades - so their loss is a huge personal blow to us. And the death toll is rising inexorably.

Threat of Invasions

Environment criminals have taken advantage of the pandemic to ramp up their activities. The terrible fires we saw last year are already happening and data from Brazil's Space Institute show that deforestation this year is up at least fifty percent on last year, increasing the threat to indigenous communities. In the past invaders have brought malaria into indigenous territotries; there is a high chance they will now bring Covid-19.

Our match funding is still in place. Please give whatever you can.

More information:

To set up monthly donations to Tribes Alive click here

Al Jazeera: Inidigenous people, Guardians of the Forest

Guardian: Amazon Forest, Covid-19 and Indigenous Activists

Reuters: Brazil's tribes fear coronavirus is next lethal import

BBC: Coronavirus 'could wipe out Brazil's indigenous people'