{"id":161914,"date":"2020-06-01T12:00:17","date_gmt":"2020-06-01T11:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=161914"},"modified":"2020-05-30T05:52:20","modified_gmt":"2020-05-30T04:52:20","slug":"deforestation-oil-spills-and-coronavirus-crises-converge-in-the-amazon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2020\/06\/deforestation-oil-spills-and-coronavirus-crises-converge-in-the-amazon\/","title":{"rendered":"Deforestation, Oil Spills, and Coronavirus: Crises Converge in the Amazon"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>29 May 2020 &#8211; <\/em>Brazil recently became the country with the second highest number of documented COVID-19 cases in the world, trailing only the United States. Though it still lags its North American neighbor in this raw total, Brazil\u2019s daily number of reported deaths was roughly double that seen in the U.S. this week. The <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/covid19.who.int\/region\/amro\/country\/br\" >latest data<\/a> show that the country has suffered roughly 400,000 confirmed cases and 25,000 deaths.<\/p>\n<p>Early reports suggest that Brazil\u2019s indigenous peoples are being especially hard hit by the virus. According to the Articulation of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil, an indigenous rights organization, the mortality rate among this population of nearly one million is <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/edition.cnn.com\/2020\/05\/23\/world\/coronavirus-indigenous-death-apib-intl\/index.html\" >double<\/a> that experienced in Brazil overall. (The government has reported a far lower rate, but its figures only account for a much narrower sliver of the country\u2019s indigenous population, according to the organization.)<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not just Brazil. The entire Amazon region, which ecompasses parts of Peru, Colombia, and Bolivia as well, is becoming a hotbed for the novel coronavirus. According to the <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/coica.org.ec\/\" >Coordinator of the Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon Basin<\/a> (COICA), as of Tuesday the region has seen an estimated 2,278 positive cases and 504 deaths across approximately 73 different Amazon indigenous nations, suggesting a sobering mortality rate. A significant chunk of these indigenous case and death totals are not included in the World Health Organization\u2019s figures, according to COICA, due to government undercounting. But COICA also believes that even their own estimates do not give the full picture.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_161918\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/brazil-brasil-coronavirus-covid-graveyard.jpg\" ><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-161918\" class=\"wp-image-161918\" src=\"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/brazil-brasil-coronavirus-covid-graveyard.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"338\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/brazil-brasil-coronavirus-covid-graveyard.jpg 720w, https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/brazil-brasil-coronavirus-covid-graveyard-300x169.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-161918\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Latin America&#8217;s biggest graveyard from the sky. bbc.com<\/p><\/div>\n<aside id=\"aside-465162\" class=\"aside aside--465162 aside--fy20-spring-appeal-inline-aside aside--post_inline aside--simple\" data-hide-donor=\"\" data-hide-subscriber=\"\">\n<div class=\"aside__content\"><\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s important to note that such data is very conservative since there are still several limitations to get a full picture of the real extent of the crisis in remote areas,\u201d said Oscar Soria, campaign director for Avaaz, a nonprofit working with COICA to advocate for global action on indigenous rights and climate change. Those limitations include the extreme remoteness of many indigenous territories, as well as a lack of testing kits and access to healthcare.<\/p>\n<p>In the Umariacu village near the border of Peru and Colombia, the first three of Brazil\u2019s COVID-19 deaths were indigenous elders, who were evidently infected by younger tribe members who left the village to collect government assistance payments and trade fish for other food, according to <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/world-nation\/story\/2020-05-18\/virus-heads-upriver-in-brazil-amazon-sickens-native-people\" >the Associated Press<\/a>. In the village of Tres Unidos \u2014 which is five hours by boat from Manaus, the country\u2019s hardest-hit major city per capita \u2014 indigenous residents <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-health-coronavirus-brazil-indigenous\/isolation-not-enough-to-save-amazon-indigenous-village-from-covid-19-idUSKBN22Y2M3\" >banned all visitors<\/a> from entering their territory, in hopes that isolation would keep them safe. But even that drastic measure couldn\u2019t prevent the arrival of the devastating virus.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the pandemic, environmental threats like mining and logging persist across the Amazon. In fact, deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon, which accounts for two-thirds of the rainforest\u2019s total area, has not let up since the onset of the pandemic, <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/news.mongabay.com\/2020\/05\/amazon-deforestation-increases-for-13th-straight-month-in-brazil\/\" >according to data<\/a> released early this month. The yearlong period ending April 30 saw the most accumulated annual deforestation since data collection began in 2007. Now, the region\u2019s environmental land defenders are struggling to simultaneously protect the forest and keep the novel coronavirus at bay.<\/p>\n<p>Deforestation in Brazil has surged since President Jair Bolsonaro assumed office in January 2019. Bolsonaro, who critics have dubbed the \u201cTrump of the Tropics,\u201d has weakened environmental regulations while in office. The Brazilian president has also granted amnesty for fines for illegal deforestation, slashed budgets for environmental law enforcement, criticized his own administration\u2019s scientists, and used indigenous people and environmental NGOs as scapegoats for last year\u2019s massive fires in the Amazon \u2014 fires his administration has been accused of <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/2019\/07\/06\/brazil-amazon-rainforest-indigenous-conservation-agribusiness-ranching\/\" >tacitly supporting<\/a>. (Bolsonaro also made headlines for <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thelancet.com\/journals\/lancet\/article\/PIIS0140-6736(20)31095-3\/fulltext\" >ignoring social distancing<\/a> measures and firing officials who criticized his tactics at the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak.)<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEnvironmental threats continue, and deforestation is increasing; cocoa production in parts of the Amazon is increasing,\u201d said Suzanne Pelletier, executive director of Rainforest Foundation US, during a press call early this month. \u201cIt\u2019s exacerbating the problem of the pandemic in indigenous communities \u2014 because not only are they facing a public health threat, but they are also facing increasing environmental threats at the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Among these environmental threats are two oil pipelines that <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/news.mongabay.com\/2020\/05\/massive-erosion-likely-due-to-hydropower-dam-causes-oil-spill-on-ecuadors-coca-river\/\" >collapsed early last month<\/a> in Ecuador, releasing roughly 15,000 barrels of oil into the Amazon\u2019s waterways. As the COVID-19 pandemic makes clean water access even more essential to indigenous communities, the oil spill\u2019s fallout is all the more threatening. Indigenous communities in the Ecuadorian Amazon have <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rappler.com\/world\/regions\/latin-america\/260044-ecuador-amazon-communities-sue-oil-spill\" >filed a lawsuit<\/a> against their national government and the oil companies involved, accusing them not promptly alerting residents about the spill.<\/p>\n<p>The Amazon rainforest houses at least 10 percent of the world\u2019s biodiversity. Its trees also function as the planet\u2019s lungs, sucking carbon out of the air and storing it \u2014 but that climate benefit is threatened as deforestation begins to release those stores. Last year\u2019s massive fires ravaged vast swaths of the Amazon and exacerbated the region\u2019s air pollution \u2014 an especially troubling development now that research is beginning to <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/grist.org\/justice\/study-even-the-tiniest-amount-of-air-pollution-makes-covid-19-more-deadly\/\" >suggest a link<\/a> between air pollution and the most severe COVID-19 outcomes.<\/p>\n<p>Early this month, a coalition of groups including Rainforest Foundation US and COICA launched an <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/rainforestfoundation.org\/partners-indigenous-peoples-ally-organizations-amazon-emergency-fund\/\" >Amazon Emergency Fund<\/a> to provide indigenous peoples in Brazil and neighboring countries with resources like personal protective equipment, testing kits, and transportation to healthcare providers.<\/p>\n<p>In countries like Guyana and Suriname, the funds can also spread awareness of ongoing problems that predate the pandemic, according to Sirito-Yana Aloema, president of the Organization of Natives in Suriname.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn the Guianas, we have a problem with gold miners entering our country \u2014 and a lot of illegal loggers \u2014 during the pandemic,\u201d he said. \u201cWe want to bring awareness to the indigenous people and use the funds for translation, transportation, and to improve our way of living during this emergency.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>_________________________________________<\/p>\n<p class=\"author-header-bio\" style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"><em>Rachel Ramirez is an environmental justice fellow at <\/em>Grist<em>.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/grist.org\/justice\/deforestation-oil-spills-and-coronavirus-crises-converge-in-the-amazon\/\" >Go to Original &#8211; grist.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>29 May 2020 &#8211; Brazil recently became the country with the second highest number of COVID-19 cases in the world, trailing only the United States. Its daily number of reported deaths was double that seen in the U.S. this week. The country has suffered roughly 400,000 confirmed cases and 25,000 deaths.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":161918,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[180],"tags":[536,547,271,1879,1829,1868,794,289,401,710,1937,1632,1864,1102,1334,126],"class_list":["post-161914","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-brics","tag-amazonia","tag-brazil","tag-community","tag-compassion","tag-coronavirus","tag-covid-19","tag-deforestation","tag-economy","tag-environment","tag-health","tag-lockdown","tag-oil-spill","tag-pandemic","tag-public-health","tag-social-conflict","tag-violence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/161918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}