Brazil’s First Confirmed Coronavirus Case in the Amazons Comes to Light
Image Credits – Time
The first confirmed strains of the virus have been detected in an indigenous woman living in a village deep inside the Amazon rainforest. This is The first instance of the novel coronavirus case to be reported in Brazil among over 300 tribes. The report was released by Sesai, the indigenous health service unit of the Health Ministry.
The 20-year-old woman who contracted the virus hails from the Kokama tribe resides in the district of Santo Antonio do Iá. It lies near the border of Colombo about 880km or 550 miles from the state capital of Manaus into the Amazon course as per statements released by Sesai on Wednesday.
Four more cases were confirmed in the district that included a doctor who was confirmed the contraction only last week. The news came as a devastating one as the epidemic could now spread in the interiors and indigenous communities and the results would be unmanageable.
Regarding the 20-year-old woman, Sesai said that she was associated with medical work and had been in close contact with the doctor who tested positive for COVID-19. Among her other 15 health co-workers and 12 patients who were tested for the virus, only she was fond positive after the entire team was prescribed tests after the doctor came out positive. None of their names were made public.
A few weeks ago, the doctor had returned from a vacation in the southern part of Brazil to work with one of the largest tribes in the Amazon, the Tikunas. The tribe consists of about 30,000 people living across the upper Amazon in the bordering lands between Colombia and Peru.
The woman who was tested positive could be asymptomatic as she was still not shown any symptoms of the virus. However, Sesai stated that she has been prescribed home isolation with her family.
Health experts have already said an outbreak in this part of the world would be lethal for all 850,000 indigenous people living in Brazil. These people have been largely affected by diseases carried into their community mostly by Europeans like flue, malaria, and smallpox for centuries now.
The risk here is that there living conditions might spread the virus more effectively and faster. Indigenous people living in communities and hamlets mostly construct houses that thatched and hence, not the bet constructional structures. This largely increases the risk of contagion even if one member of the entire population stream contract the virus.
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