the truth about indigenous health

Malnutrition among the Yanomami, although shocking and regrettable, is nothing new in Brazil, as the current government wants to make it seem, always in an attempt to blame all the country’s problems on former president Bolsonaro, who was in power for just Four years.

The fuss made last Saturday (21) by President Lula, after visiting the Yanomami Health House in Roraima, and the display in the press of photos of malnourished indigenous children, takes the facts out of context and takes the focus off the cultural reality behind this tragedy.

Those who truly know the Indians’ routine say that hunger and malnutrition result from a set of factors present in the Yanomami’s routine for decades, starting with cultural aspects, which few dare to fight.

Malnutrition of the Yanomami

This Friday (27th) I interviewed Paraiba nurse Khylvio Alves Valões, who has been working with Indians in Roraima since the Ministry of Health created the Special Secretariat for Indigenous Health (SESAI), in 2010, during the first Dilma government.

For seven years he frequented the Yanomami villages and cites, first, the cultural issue, as responsible for historical malnutrition.

“There is a historical context behind the issue of malnutrition of the Yanomami people… Historically, you put food in a village, the men, the warriors, who have to be strong and nourished to defend the village, will eat (sic) first; then the women and, only then, the children. The elderly, that’s about it.”

Khylvio Alves Valões, indigenous health nurse

Khylvio also recalls the arrival of miners in the region over ten years ago. That was when the Indians began to have access to clandestine firearms, provided by garimpeiros in exchange for permitting mining on their lands.

From then on, conflicts between the tribes worsened, hunting became more difficult, as well as the cultivation of land and the access of medical teams to the tribes. Allied to the cultural issue, all of this can be blamed on the malnutrition of the Yanomami.

solution focus

Over the last four years, after President Bolsonaro visited indigenous leaders, the villages began to receive regular food baskets.

In Khylvio’s view, if malnutrition continues, it is not necessarily a lack of food, but of professionals to help the Indians prepare food, which is not part of their diet. And there is a lack of nutritionists to guide and monitor the malnourished.

Displaying pictures of skeletal children to the press, implying that, because they are young, they are the result of recent political mistakes, is not just a lie. It is unwillingness to understand the problem and focus on the solution. The malnutrition of the Yanomami is real. And political narrative does not fill the belly.