With a vaccination rate that is already surpassing 120,000 patients per day, Peru is finally showing glimmers of hope that it will overcome the worst of the pandemic. However, a glance towards the Peruvian Amazon shows a different reality. Recovery from COVID-19 in this biodiverse region will be difficult and Indigenous communities will need international support.
As we’ve previously reported, government institutions abandoned the Amazon region to focus on containing the pandemic in the cities. Indigenous peoples responded with the same strategy that has worked for them through more than 500 years of pandemics: go deep into the jungle to their tambos, the houses they use on hunting and fishing expeditions.
Unfortunately, since they’ve left, illegal loggers have deforested large areas of protected primary forests in the vacant Indigenous communities.