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Mongabay staff writer Aimee Gabay joins the Newscast this week to discuss her reporting trip to the Peruvian Amazon, where she spoke<\/span><\/a> with the Indigenous Mats\u00e9s community. She made the trip initially to examine environmental threats to Mats\u00e9s territory. Instead, she found them suffering from an epidemic of malaria and hepatitis B, which they have been asking the Peruvian government to help address.<\/p>\n \u201cThe story itself was a surprise \u2026 every question directed to them about environmental changes would immediately become an issue about health,\u201d Gabay says.<\/p>\n The Mats\u00e9s people have long experienced conflict with outsiders such as rubber tappers encroaching into their territory. So in 1969, in the hope of finding help to ease the conflict, they chose to initiate contact with the outside world, reaching out to evangelical missionaries, Gabay says. But making contact also exposed them to diseases they\u2019d never encountered before, and since then they\u2019ve suffered from a barrage of epidemics.<\/p>\n \u201cThey don\u2019t have the immunological defenses to be able to fight these diseases that maybe, for us, we are constantly exposed to,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n The current epidemic of malaria and hepatitis B they face is being exacerbated by climate change, drought, and state neglect. Prolonged dry weather allows for favorable conditions for malaria-bearing mosquitoes to breed, and at the same time cuts off the river transit that the Mats\u00e9s depend on for access to health care.<\/p>\n Community members have travelled to the nearest major city to plead with the Peruvian government, but they say they\u2019re still not receiving the proper health care that they need \u2014 sometimes dying after they reach the city, according to Mats\u00e9s chief Leo Chuma Teca Beso.<\/p>\n The Peruvian government has had guidelines for addressing health risks for Indigenous communities for nearly two decades. Still, authorities say they struggle to implement the measures outlined in them, Gabay says.<\/p>\n \u201cOn paper, they do have the protocols. They have got plans, but it\u2019s the implementation that we\u2019re not seeing.\u201d<\/p>\n Neighboring Indigenous people who continue to live in voluntary isolation or initial contact in the Yavar\u00ed-Tapiche Corridor are also at risk of exposure should they encounter any of the Mats\u00e9s who carry diseases, she adds. And the combination of climate impacts and extractive industries encroaching on their territory adds even more risk.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Yavar\u00ed-Tapiche territorial corridor is an area that has been under threat for a long time by oil and gas projects, by illegal mining, illegal loggers and narcotraffickers as well. So if the \u2026 isolated people have to move further away from the areas they usually inhabit because of disease, water availability, etc., they\u2019re more likely to run into some of these invaders that could expose them to some of these diseases that could wipe them out entirely, which is super serious.\u201d<\/p>\n Gabay says this story highlights the delicate state of human health amid increasing climate impacts, and underscores the interconnectedness of human, environmental, and planetary health.<\/p>\n \u201cThe moment there is an unhealthy environment, that automatically leads to more disease,\u201d she says. \u201cPlanetary health<\/span><\/a> is something that\u2019s super important, and I think there needs to be a lot more focus or emphasis on \u2026 seeing all of these issues as intertwined rather than as separate things.\u201d<\/p>\n Mike DiGirolamo<\/i><\/b> is the host & producer for the Mongabay Newscast based in Sydney. Find him on <\/i>LinkedIn<\/i><\/span><\/a> and <\/i>Bluesky<\/i><\/span><\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n Banner image: <\/i><\/b>San Mateo village, one of 29 Mats\u00e9s communities in Peru, on the banks of the G\u00e1lvez River. Image by Aimee Gabay\/Mongabay.<\/i><\/p>\n Notice: Transcripts are machine and human generated and lightly edited for accuracy. They may contain errors.<\/small><\/i><\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> The story itself was a surprise. So when I went to the Mats\u00e9s territory to, to do this field reporting, I actually set out to work on a feature that looks at environmental threats to the Mats\u00e9s territory every question directed to them about environmental changes would immediately become an issue about health. And it got to the point where I was like, th-this story, I\u2019m, I\u2019m asking the wrong questions here. I\u2019m looking at the wrong thing. And so literally the surprise itself was the fact that there was a health issue.<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> Welcome to the Mongabay Newscast. I\u2019m your host, Mike DiGirolamo. Bring you weekly conversations with experts, authors, scientists, and activists working on the front lines of conservation, shining a light on some of the most pressing issues facing our planet, and holding people in power to account. This podcast is edited on Gadigal Land. Today on the newscast, we speak with Mongabay staff writer Aimee Gabay, covering Indigenous affairs. Gabay joins me to speak about her recent reporting trip to the Peruvian Amazon, where she connected with the Mats\u00e9s Indigenous people. Until 1969, this community lived in voluntary isolation, officially deciding to make contact with a group of evangelical missionaries, the reasons for which will be discussed later in this episode. Following this contact, the Mats\u00e9s have faced disease epidemics. When Gabay visited this community, she found them suffering from outbreaks of malaria and hepatitis B. After speaking with community members and leaders, it became clear that neglect by the state of Peru, climate change, and droughts were exacerbating these disease outbreaks. Gabay details what the state of Peru is and isn\u2019t doing to help the situation, despite Mats\u00e9s community leaders pleading for access to vaccinations. For neighboring Indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation or recent contact in the greater corridor, there is a heightened risk for them as well a need for access to medication that is administered in a culturally accessible and appropriate manner. Gabay tells me that while the state of Peru has had guidelines and health protocols in place for people in voluntary isolation for decades, there have been major gaps in its implementation. And with an upcoming El Ni\u00f1o, the Mats\u00e9s fear this will intensify their health risks.<\/p>\n Hi, Aimee. Thank you for joining me today. First of all, I just wanna say , this story looks like it was an incredible effort, so I want to commend you on the work that you\u2019ve done here. But before we get into what is happening with the, the Mats\u00e9s people, can you tell our audience the context for us? Because this goes back a century, I believe<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah. Thank you. It\u2019s a pleasure to be here. And yes, exactly. So the Mats\u00e9s people were very recently contacted in the grand scheme of things, so they decided to initiate contact with the outside world in 1969. So the health issues that I wrote about, these are not necessarily something new. From the moment they were in contact already, the missionaries who they first contacted reported in some of their journals that the Mats\u00e9s were almost immediately struck with many different types of diseases. The issue now is that this has been exacerbated and has continued for all of this time and has been made a lot worse because of government inaction and also environmental changes. So droughts are a big one, not only because it brings more disease, but also because it prevents the Mats\u00e9s from being able to get the healthcare they need. These people depend on the waterways. There\u2019s no highways, there\u2019s no runways for, for airplanes to arrive in their territory. So the moment there\u2019s a drought, if a health crisis does hit it\u2019s not very easy for health teams to make it inside the territory, especially to some of the furthest communities who are almost two days away on boat<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> I think it might be important for us to discuss with whom they first made voluntary contact and why. Can, you tell us that?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah, absolutely. So the Mats\u00e9s decided to initiate contact with evangelical missionaries in 1969, as I said. The reason they chose to do this was because at that time they were facing a lot of conflict within the communities and outside. So it all started with people, especially rubber tappers primarily rubber tappers and other invaders starting to come into their territory. This was increasing the amount of contact they were having, not out of their own um, will, of course. This was leading to a lot of problems. So the Mats\u00e9s were very hostile towards these outsiders. They saw them as a threat for good reason. And there was a couple of scenarios, for example, where the Mats\u00e9s came into contact with some of these people, for example, the rubber tappers and it led to a lot of violence, and a lot of people got killed.<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> Here, Aimee says this is where Roberto explains how he used to hide from outsiders before contact because of a great fear and the dangerous confrontation between Mestizos and the Mats\u00e9s before contact<\/p>\n Speaker 2:<\/b> pacho. <\/span><\/p>\n Roberto:<\/b><\/span> Ya caneque.<\/p>\n Speaker 2:<\/b><\/span> Tsiraravi, no.<\/p>\n Roberto:<\/b><\/span> Tsirambo, no. Tsirambo, no. Eh, kuma pehe daku onravi. Kuma pehe daku ichin. Mbi ia kirana ia no pote potiet.<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> At one point the, the Peruvian government entered the Mats\u00e9s territory because they were\u2013 they wanted to build a road. And when they came into the, in, into contact with the Mats\u00e9s the Mats\u00e9s s- attacked the people who were there. And the Peruvian government responded by calling on the US Air Force that was based in Panama to drop bombs on the Mats\u00e9s communities. It destroyed the longhouses. Longhouses are basically the communal um, buildings where Mats\u00e9s, the Indigenous people all used to live together. They all used to sleep in the same space. But these bombs completely destroyed a lot of these places. And they ended up having to flee into the forest to run away, and these kinds of conflicts were ongoing. It was constant. And after fighting, running away f- fighting even more, running away, it just ended up becoming a massive problem. Obviously if they weren\u2019t if they had to run away from the kinds of places they usually settled, it had impacts also for food availability. Mats\u00e9s are hunters. They look for wild meat. They were forced to go to places where there was less meat. And basically, the Mats\u00e9s told me when I went to visit, they were just tired of all of the violence. They were tired of the fighting. , And so it was actually a small group of them that decided to go ahead and initiate contact with these missionaries who had already for a long time tried to make contact with them, but they rejected it. But then this small group of people were like, \u201cNo, we don\u2019t want this fighting anymore. We\u2019re gonna go.\u201d And they actually thought that these, that there was a possibility that they could be killed by initiating this contact. But for them, after all of the fighting, they were so tired, they were like, \u201cI would rather do this, see what happens and who knows?\u201d So these, the actual people who initiated this contact are actually seen by the other Mats-Mats\u00e9s people as very brave people that, that took this sort of like plunge for, for the safety and security and stability of the Mats\u00e9s people<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> That\u2019s really important to note because they celebrate that event every year on the 30th of August, and it, and it sounds like it was a really pivotal moment for them. But of course that, that also came with some other things as well. And so you interviewed Roberto Necca Tumi Unan, and he\u2019s an elder in the community and one of the last surviving elders born before this first voluntary contact. What did he tell you?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah, so it was a really interesting interview. As you mentioned, Roberto was alive before first contact with the missionaries. And he described what it, what it was like. So he described actually going out hunting with his father, uncles, other men in the community and actually hearing outsiders come into their territory. And he described, he said that they would all run and they would hide and they would cover themselves with leaves not to be seen or not to make contact with these outsiders because it was such a dangerous thing for them. He described what life was like before, how, as I said earlier, they would all sleep in, in these traditional longhouses, which are called malocas all together. And the kinds of foods they relied on and all of these kinds of things. So that\u2019s\u2013 he, he looks back at that time with, like, a lot of nostalgia. It was it, it was definitely a really good time for him, but it was definitely already present in his childhood that there was a lot of pressure on them, that there was\u2013 that they were running from something. They couldn\u2019t really ever settle.<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> And so another result of this though, is that the community has dealt with outbreaks for decades now of malaria, influenza, , and now hepatitis B, all brought in from the outside. What did he tell you about this? And also, what did he tell you about how the, the climate factors are influencing these epidemics?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah. So, he told me that before contact, they, they never really suffered from any diseases. That wasn\u2019t something that was known to the Mats\u00e9s. And it was very clear from the moment they did make contact from then on that there was this new thing that they had never really faced before. So as you mentioned, all of those diseases were really present and and it is widely known that uncontacted people and recently contacted people are very vulnerable when it comes to exposure to diseases. They don\u2019t have the immunological defenses to be able to fight these diseases that maybe for us, we are constantly exposed to. But for them expo- like if they were to run into, for example, a rubber tapper or something like that and this rubber tapper was to be carrying one of these diseases, that is enough to cause a genocide amongst these people, especially without the healthcare and all of those types of things. And even recently contacted people are still considered highly vulnerable to these diseases. And Roberto said he, he literally said they went from not having any of these diseases to all of a sudden entire families dying, and they didn\u2019t really understand why at that time<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> And how is climate change influencing\u2013 I mean, I think that it\u2019s, it\u2019s easier to see how climate change would influence something like malaria but it\u2019s a little bit more difficult to see how it influences hepatitis B. Can you explain the difference there?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah, absolutely. So malaria there\u2019s a lot more clear link with, for example, environmental changes like drought, and that is because mosquitoes, for example they thrive in conditions where, for example, there are much higher temperatures and pools of water especially. So for example, In places like the Mats\u00e9s territory or in other places across the Amazon, especially where there has been some kind of forest degradation or some land changes droughts as well, et cetera this can create the conditions for mosquitoes to proliferate. There is something known as the forest fringe effect. And so in places where people settle or in places where there are sort of, for example, some deforestation it does\u2026 in those areas there is increased temperatures and also it affects the ability of soils to absorb water, and therefore it creates sort of like these small pools which are like the perfect breeding ground for mosquitoes. So that\u2019s one of the\u2013 That\u2019s the link with malaria. With hepatitis, it\u2019s more complex. So hepatitis B, which is what\u2019s present in the Mats\u00e9s territory, is actually sexually transmitted. And it doesn\u2019t really have a connection to, for example, drought or high temperatures, et cetera. But the indirect problem, which is really hitting the Mats\u00e9s right now, is that droughts, et cetera impact the water levels of the rivers that the Mats\u00e9s depend on to travel. The Mats\u00e9s, as I mentioned earlier, they don\u2019t have highways, and they don\u2019t have any sort of like, ability to like land a plane or anything close by. So for some of the Mats\u00e9s, they live about two days away from the closest town which then you would need to get in ex- in serious circumstances, a small aircraft to take you to the biggest city, which is Iquitos. This takes a long time, a lot of expenses. And so when you are suffering from hepatitis B, the way to treat that, because it\u2019s not\u2026 you can\u2019t cure it, it\u2019s, it\u2019s treatment for the rest of your life. You need vaccinations and obviously medication for the rest of the symptoms. The Mats\u00e9s, they don\u2019t have health clinics inside of that territory. And so if they do suffer from something like hepatitis B, they need medical attention. But if the water levels are too low, they can\u2019t reach that medical attention, and in the case of the Mats\u00e9s who have not the most of the population haven\u2019t been vaccinated yet it also affects the ability of healthcare workers from entering the territory to reach especially those communities that are furthest away to be able to actually do\u2013 to carry out that vaccination campaign. And not only that, but the, the lower water levels also impacts their ability to not just obtain medication, but also some food supplies that they\u2019re depending on from outside nowadays. Wa-the water quality, they don\u2019t have potable water so droughts, et cetera, also have an impact on water. And then this also can lead to other health impacts that can can sort of like, impact their ability to fight any disease they have, whether it be malaria, whether it be hepatitis B or even a cold<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> Hello, listeners, and thank you as always for tuning in. As I always like to mention to you, Mongabay is a nonprofit news organization. And we report daily from nature\u2019s frontline. However, this podcast relies on the funding from listeners like you. So I encourage you to support the newscast by going to patreon.com\/mongabay. There, you can pledge to become a monthly sponsor of the show. Even if it\u2019s just a dollar per month, it makes a big difference. If you\u2019d like to read the full story from today\u2019s podcast by Aimee Goodbye, you can find a link in the show notes<\/p>\n You also spoke with Mats\u00e9s Chief Leo Chuma Teca Beso. What did he tell you and how does he feel about the situation?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah, so Leo is really concerned about this situation. It\u2019s something he\u2019s been fighting for for a long time, going to, for example, Iquitos um, the city in Loreto and even as far as Lima. He, he went there to speak to the Ministry of Health in Peru and basically plead for, for health teams to visit the Mats\u00e9s to deal with this situation. He told me that there\u2019s Mats\u00e9s people dying on the streets. A lot of them, if they can get on a plane to Iquitos, for example, they end up dying on the streets because by that point the situation is so far gone. They enter a st- a stage of\u2026 Well, they enter the\u2026 Hepatitis B basically at its most severe can turn into cirrhosis, which is like kind of like the next level. At this point, it\u2019s, it\u2019s almost impossible to, to cure that. And Leo said that a lot of Mats\u00e9s, if they do manage to even reach that far, they end up literally dying on the streets. He said those words.<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> Here chief Leo says, \u201cAnd yet here people are dying of illness. I don\u2019t know how it can be. People are dying monthly, weekly in the city of Iquitos. Where is the government support?\u201d<\/p>\n Leo:<\/b><\/span> Y nosotros, la gente se muere de enfermos. Entonces, a m\u00ed me\u2013 no s\u00e9 c\u00f3mo puede ser, la gente muere mensual, semanal, muere en la ciudad de Iquitos. \u00bfD\u00f3nde est\u00e1 el, el apoyo del Gobierno?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> He knows many families where lots of people have, have died to\u2013 because of these problems and he feels a lot of frustration because he feels the, the Peruvian health system has not provided adequate care for them, especially as people who are classified as recently contacted. The Peruvian government, the Ministry of Health do actually have protocols to protect people like the Mats\u00e9s and unfortunately that care is not reaching them no matter how many years they\u2019ve been asking for it<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> Peru\u2019s Ministry of Health the acronym of which I think is MINSA, has recorded zero deaths from hepatitis despite the fact that multiple people you\u2019ve spoken with, including a tropical diseases doctor, have told you that\u2019s inaccurate. Can you explain why they are recording zero deaths?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah. So, basically MINSA, they do, they, for starters, they don\u2019t carry out studies on specific Indigenous populations. So they do their counts based on regional statistics. And MINSA is suffering from itself as as an agency from a lot of budget cuts. They don\u2019t have a lot of funding. And so they\u2019re really slow to update those numbers. Aside from the fact that they do have all of these problems most of the people I spoke to the Mats\u00e9s, but also organizations, Indigenous rights organizations who are also supporting the Mats\u00e9s and these doctors confirmed to me that the reason why the number is zero is because MINSA has never actually gone to the communities to do an entire community-wide screening for these diseases.<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> In the following clip, Aimee says Chief Leo recounts how when he proposed to the Minister of Health in Lima last year that they intervene, the ministry denied that the Mats\u00e9s are suffering from any of these diseases<\/p>\n Leo:<\/b><\/span> Ya justo me hice salud, \u00bfno? Entonces propuse mi propuesta para que ellos puedan intervenir Entonces ellos dicen que, que las comunidades nativas no cuentan ese tipo de enfermedad, es sana<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> So if they\u2019re not going to do the tests, of course there\u2019s zero deaths, and of course there\u2019s zero cases. They have since last December mostly because of the work of some of these organizations and the Mats\u00e9s. They did end up doing a first screening, but they only did 20% of the population. There\u2019s still 80% that hasn\u2019t been screened. And so in that screening, they found, I think it was 17 cases of hepatitis B. And most of these people, the LEO, for example, the leader expect that number to be much higher if they were to do, to, to basically screen 100% of the population<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> As I understand it, that health brigade was in part assembled by the Mats\u00e9s and several civil society groups. And, you know, like you just mentioned there\u2019s thousands more people to screen. So what\u2019s their next move?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah, correct. So it was organized. The health brigade was sort of organized by these people. And the next step is to do the next round of vaccinations. So when they went to do the screening, the health brigade, they also vaccinated about 490 people out of the 1,500 who are eligible for a vaccine. And so the next round is supposed to be in October. The problem is we\u2019ve already entered drought in the Peruvian Amazon. And I have quite a lot of concerns that that health team isn\u2019t even gonna be able to make it<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> So obviously the story does not end here, and there are several other groups of Indigenous communities in isolation and initial contact in and around the very large corridor the Yavar\u00ed-Tapiche territorial corridor. This is a massive, massive area. Can you tell our audience how large it is and how many people live in it and what the risks are here?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah. So the Yavar\u00ed-Tapiche Territorial Corridor spans 16 million hectares across both Peru and Brazil, and it basically co- it\u2019s basically home to the largest contingency of Indigenous people in voluntary isolation. So people, groups, Indigenous groups who have chosen to not make contact with the outside world. There are\u2026 I, I do- I can\u2019t even tell you the exact amount of numbers of how many territories there are within it. So it might make more sense if I explain what a territorial corridor is. It\u2019s basically a bunch of Indigenous territories all together in this large area. And the idea is by having all of these territories together it brings more protection for the isolated people. Isolated people, a lot of them are nomadic or semi-nomadic. , They travel to look for food. They move around based on the seasons. When it\u2019s dry season, they might go look for places where there\u2019s more water. In the wet season, they might go to look for places where there\u2019s more fruits, et cetera. And so having this massive piece of land is really important for them to be able to do that without, you know, being disturbed. Yeah, so that, that would be the Yavar\u00ed-Tapiche Territorial Corridor.<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> And so what are the potential health risks for the rest of these Indigenous communities either in voluntary isolation or initial contact?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah. So the, as I mentioned earlier Indigenous people in voluntary isolation, they are a lot more vulnerable to disease. And so if people like the Mats\u00e9s who live who are surrounded, their territory is surrounded by forests where there are\u2013 they know isolated people exist. So the Mats\u00e9s even today when they go hunting, sometimes they find evidence of the presence of isolated people around. So they live very close. And so if the Mats\u00e9s are carrying certain diseases that can spread easily to these isolated people that is a huge problem that could, as I mentioned earlier, lead to something as severe as a genocide towards these people. There\u2019s been countless records of this happening throughout history in Peru and across the Amazon and many other places. And depending on the disease, it also brings more risks or less. So of course, something like hepatitis B being sexually transmitted, that is harder f- to reach the, the isolated people, for example. But the same risks of malaria, like I say, any impact to the land where these isolated people live could create the conditions for mosquitoes to proliferate. The same issues that a drought brings, for example, the impact on the water. So when there\u2019s lower water levels, there\u2019s more chance to for there to be diseases. Obviously access to water and all of these things to be able to fight these diseases. When there is drought or problems like this, they end up having to move further away to find more food um, more water. This increases the chances of them running into potential invaders or other Indigenous people who could be carrying diseases. So this obviously heightens the risk as well. The Yavar\u00ed-Tapiche territorial corridor is an area that has been under threat for a long time by oil and gas projects, by illegal mining, illegal, illegal loggers and narco traffickers as well. So if the Indigenous, the isolated people have to move further away from the areas they usually inhabit because of disease, water availability, et cetera, they\u2019re more likely to run into some of these invaders that could expose them to some of these diseases that could wipe them out entirely, which is super serious<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> The Mats\u00e9s also did mention to you that they\u2019re really worried about the upcoming El Nino. What did they tell you? And also, what did the National Meteorology and Hydrology Service of Peru tell you about this?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah, so the predicted upcoming El Ni\u00f1o event is something that\u2019s very present in the Mats\u00e9s minds. The last El Ni\u00f1o event from 2023 to 2024 had a huge impact on them. Well, it had a huge impact on most of the Amazon basin, but they, they felt those effects. The drought was very severe. A lot of the furthest communities were isolated, and so a lot of the risks that I mentioned today that could exacerbate these health issues, they are risks that basically the Mats\u00e9s have already lived before. So having that present in their mind, knowing that they\u2019re facing these issues and knowing that they could be running into this problem where, again, health teams cannot reach them, they cannot go to a health clinic, is very scary. And this was something that was coming up constantly in the interviews with the Mats\u00e9s people. And yes, in Peru, the Peruvian government, the team, the agency that\u2019s in charge of sort of meteorological studies and tracing and doing all of these projections , he also mentioned some of these effects that the Mats\u00e9s and a lot of communities in, in the Amazon faced during the last El Ni\u00f1o, and he said this is something that that they should expect to happen again. He made projections around the water levels dropping, the temperature changes, precipitation changes, et cetera. And these are all things that we know exacerbate disease<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> What did Peru\u2019s health ministry, MINSA, tell you they\u2019re doing to address the malaria threat?<\/p>\n Aimee: <\/b><\/span>MINSA was, They did acknowledge that , there are a lot of things that they haven\u2019t done. They did mention that because of these budget problems and also because of access issues, the Mats\u00e9s territory, as I mentioned, is very remote. Very, very remote. It took many hours on boat and flights, et cetera, to reach the community. I did, and some of the communities are even further, up to two days away. And so for a health team, that increases how much money is required to be able to do these kinds of campaigns. So they did acknowledge the limitations they\u2019re working with and the challenges they\u2019re working with. However, they did talk about some of the protocols they do have in place, and they\u2019re trying to make an effort to to be able to carry out. Some of this includes, for example, having culturally specific um, healthcare. So if y- even if you do have budget to carry out a vaccination campaign in an Indigenous community that might be facing an outbreak, it doesn\u2019t mean that you can just go there and do the vaccination campaign. Each Indigenous community is different, and their cosmology is different, and the way they see the world and the way that they understand what, for example, a vaccine is, what a disease is, what it means to cure someone. And so they could turn up with this whole health brigade and say, \u201cOh, we\u2019re gonna come and cure you,\u201d or, \u201cWe\u2019re gonna come and give you this treatment.\u201d And the community might say, \u201cNo way. You\u2019re not giving us this vaccine,\u201d or, \u201cYou\u2019re not gonna do this thing.\u201d And so they told me they are trying to sort of implement more culturally appropriate kind of healthcare for these communities. Aside from that, they are trying to work on implementing a lot of these protocols they have. So on paper, they do have the protocols. They, they have got plans, but it\u2019s the implementation that we\u2019re not seeing because of these challenges that I\u2019ve mentioned<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> I think it\u2019s important to note that those protocols that you\u2019ve mentioned a couple times now, they\u2019ve been around for decades. And, and so it I think it also speaks to the complexity of what your sources said about having culturally appropriate implementation of these vaccines. What did the people who live in these communities say to you about that aspect?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah, so this, these protocols exactly like you say, have existed for a really long time. In the case of the Mats\u00e9s they want these vaccines. They\u2019ve been pleading for these vaccines. They\u2019ve been pleading for more medical attention. They, like I mentioned, Leo Chuma ha- he went all the way to Lima to plead the Ministry of Health to, to actually do something to help the situation. So in the case of the Mats\u00e9s, the culturally specific thing isn\u2019t so big. But, but yeah the frustration is definitely there about, you know, the fact that these protocols do exist how high the risks are, and the fact that they\u2019re not getting that medical attention that, that they have a right to.<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> Was there anything that surprised you about working on this story, Aimee, or is there anything that, that you didn\u2019t expect to see?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> The story itself was a surprise. So when I went to the Mats\u00e9s territory to, to do this field reporting, I actually set out to work on a feature that looks at environmental threats to the Mats\u00e9s territory using it as one case study in the larger Yavar\u00ed-Tapiche territorial corridor and, and a lot of those threats I mentioned earlier. So I actually went there to document environmental problems, threats, and kind of the efforts to try and combat some of these problems with, you know, the unique aspect being that this, these Indigenous people are quite recently contacted. And when I arrived, interview after interview, I was asking questions about environmental threats, and people were like, \u201cWell, people are dying on the streets. Like, we are\u2013 There\u2019s something much bigger going on here that\u2019s much more urgent.\u201d Every question directed to them about environmental changes would immediately become an issue about health. And it got to the point where I was like, th-this story, I\u2019m, I\u2019m asking the wrong questions here. I\u2019m looking at the wrong thing. And so the, literally the surprise itself was the fact that there was a health issue. When I, when I actually set out there, I didn\u2019t know that this was a thing. It wasn\u2019t something that was o-one of the questions on my interview question list. It was not even something I thought about until I arrived there and I\u2019d learnt about this problem<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> So , the topic of planetary health is a relatively recent field of study. What do you think that this story highlights to the world about planetary health?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> I think that you cannot separate health from environmental issues or environmental health. I think often, I mean, you see it in UN sort of conferences, in reports, et cetera, health and the environment are seen as two entirely separate things, when in reality you can\u2019t really separate them. Whenever there is an unhealthy environment that, especially for Indigenous people who depend on the water to drink, the water for their food, for, for the fish for the forests to hunt all of these things you can\u2019t see them as, as two separate things. The moment there is an unhealthy environment, that automatically leads to more disease. So there\u2019s a direct health consequence to an unhealthy environment. And the same thing when people who like the Mats\u00e9s, who do h- put a lot of emphasis on conserving and taking care of their territory, if they\u2019re too sick to look after their territory, the environment is gonna become sick too. And that is not because the Mats\u00e9s necessarily the environment depends on the Mats\u00e9s to look after it. But the environment, to a certain extent, in places like this, they do depend on Mats\u00e9s monitoring teams to ensure that no invaders come in, to make sure that people aren\u2019t, you know, coming into their boundaries and deforesting. There are\u2013 The Mats\u00e9s are literally there. They have teams out there preventing this kind of stuff, and if they are too sick because there\u2019s a massive epidemic and they\u2019re all dying from hepatitis B and malaria, then you can\u2019t really stop these people from coming in and impacting the environment. So I think um, planetary health is something that\u2019s super important, and I think there needs to be a lot more focus or emphasis on sort of like seeing all of these issues as intertwined rather than as separate things.<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> Do you have any plans for follow-up coverage?<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Yeah, so I\u2019m watching closely to see what happens in October with this vaccination campaign. Already I spoke to Leo yesterday. You mentioned earlier that every year on August the 30th, the Mats\u00e9s people celebrate the day that they initiated contact with the missionaries. That was from the time of this recording a couple of days ago. And Leo actually couldn\u2019t reach his community because the water levels were too low, so he missed out on celebrating that super important day with his family and his community because the boat literally couldn\u2019t reach his community. He did celebrate in another one, but the drought is already there, and if they can\u2019t reach one community to the next, I\u2019m very worried about the chances of these health teams actually being able to reach the Mats\u00e9s, especially knowing this is the early stages of drought, as in the early\u2026We\u2019re just entering it, and El Ni\u00f1o is only just starting. So I definitely think what happens in October will merit another story. And then to closely look out for how the Ministry of Health responds and, and if they take any measures to kind of deal with the drought and the potential implications on this developing health issue.<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> Well, Aimee it has been a, a pleasure speaking with you. Fantastic work on this story, and keep us updated. I will um, post a link in the show notes to the story for people to read, and thank you for speaking with me today<\/p>\n Aimee:<\/b><\/span> Thank you for having me, and thank you for your interest in the story<\/p>\n Mike:<\/b><\/span> As always, if you\u2019re enjoying the Mongabay Newscast or any of our podcast content and you wanna help us out, we do encourage you to spread the word about the work we\u2019re doing and also leaving a review. But you can also support us by becoming a monthly sponsor By visiting our Patreon page at patreon.com\/mongabay. As I mentioned earlier, we are a nonprofit news outlet, so even pledging a dollar per month makes a very big difference to us. So if you\u2019re a fan of our audio reports from Nature\u2019s Frontline, go to to learn more and support the Mongabay Newscast. I also encourage you to read our news and inspiration from Nature\u2019s Frontline by going to mongabay.com. You can also follow us on social media. Find Mongabay on LinkedIn at Mongabay News and on Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Mastodon, Facebook, and TikTok, where our handle is @mongabay, and also on YouTube at MongabayTV.<\/p>\n Thank you as always for listening<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Mongabay staff writer Aimee Gabay joins the Newscast this week to discuss her reporting trip…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1266,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[12,3137,3136,2857,3139,419,14,9,214,1969,3138,11,13,10,2],"class_list":["post-1265","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-unicorn778","tag-bermain","tag-brings","tag-contacted","tag-crisis","tag-fore","tag-health","tag-online","tag-peluang","tag-people","tag-perus","tag-planetary","tag-saat","tag-slot","tag-terburuk","tag-unicorn778"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webmediamall.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webmediamall.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webmediamall.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webmediamall.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webmediamall.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1265"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/webmediamall.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1265\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webmediamall.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1266"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webmediamall.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webmediamall.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webmediamall.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n