Brazil’s indigeneous peoples are seeking their own solutions to the pandemic

The power of nature is being used to sustain communities and stop the further spread of Covid-19, writes May East

Recentlybrazilhasbecome the second country in the world to confirm over one million cases of Covid-19, as the disease continues to spread swiftly through major cities and increasingly also through the country’s indigenous populations. But while the political response has been confusing at best, indigenous people have seized the initiative to create new opportunities from the chaos.

The coronavirus outbreak is likely to have started at the edge between urban development and human intrusion into biodiverse areas, epitomised by the Chinese wet markets. In many fields of fundamental and applied ecology, the transition or edge between distinct biological communities is known as the ‘ecotone’. The word is a linguistic blend derived from the Greek eco – ‘oikos’ or environment, and tone – ‘tonos’ or tension, meaning a place of high intensity where ecologies are in tension.

In these edges between social and ecological systems, both disruption and regeneration can surprisingly co-exist. Despite being a global health pandemic, localised responses to Covid-19 are evolving in the state of Amazon at the edge of the capital city Manaus through random acts of solidarity between city and forest dwellers.

For the Sateré Mawé Indigenous Craftswomen Association craftwork is a collective exercise, nourishing their cultural identity and generating livelihood. Based next to the Andirá River, the Sateré Mawé indigenous community is known for being the first to ‘domesticate’ the energy drink guaraná, for their strenuous rituals and sophisticated crafts, made from seeds, grasses and wood from the forest.

Under women’s leadership a group moved from the traditional village to the periphery of Manaus in the 70s. Since then their singular craftwork has become the life blood of the Sateré Mawé women. When the ports of Manaus closed down and the flow of tourism halted due to Covid-19, the women reinvented themselves. In a week they taught themselves how to sew and channelled their creative force towards the production of promasks. With the support of the Uk-based Artists Project Earth (APE) second hand sewing machines were bought and masks started to be distributed amongst the edge communities of Manaus and 83 indigenous villages of the Rio Negro.

Not far from them, another collective – the Mothers without Borders Association – is located on the outskirts of Manaus where they care for the unseen in society. To support their work, they make syrups and soaps by utilising the Amazon’s natural resources.

This work by these two groups of women is important for two reasons: first, it provides a source of income at a time of grave economic uncertainty and, second, their work is helping to minimise the spread of the virus.

Historically diseases like common flu have been powerful factors in decimating indigenous peoples in Brazil. In the 1960s hundreds of indigenous peoples died in the Upper Xingu region from a measles outbreak after coming into contact with non-indigenous settlers and explorers. There is a growing fear that Covid-19 may have the same impact in those communities.

For them, the pandemic comes at an especially difficult time, with weakened institutional protections, under-investment in healthcare and increasing land grabs from illegal miners and loggers. Add a fast moving, highly contagious virus into the mix, and the result – according to Medecins Sans Frontieres – is “a recipe for disaster”.

Manaus inaugurated what it calls the nation’s first hospital wing dedicated specifically to treat indigenous people infected by coronavirus, but it quickly became overrun. With access to healthcare limited, many have instead turned to traditional natural remedies. The Amazon rainfortective