The mining invasion of Yanomami land deepened the challenges faced by children and adolescents of this indigenous peoplepoints out a report released this Wednesday (15) by the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef), with support from the Hutukara Yanomami Association (HAY). Between 2019 and 2022 alone, when illegal activity reached its peak, at least 570 child deaths were recorded caused by preventable and treatable diseases such as malnutrition, malaria, pneumonia and parasitic infestations.
Illegal activity caused many socio-environmental problems, mainly due to the contamination of rivers with mercury and the occupation of territories, impacting the processes of hunting, collecting and maintaining farms. This process occurred in parallel with the disintegration of the health system in the region, leaving the population unassisted.
The Yanomami people are made up of around 31 thousand people and occupy the largest indigenous land in Brazil. There are 390 communities spread over 9.6 million hectares, in the states of Roraima and Amazonas.
The situation became so drastic that, in 2023, the federal government declared a Public Health Emergency of National Importance in the territory. Since then, more than 7,400 integrated actions to combat mining have been carried out. In the health sector, the number of professionals working in the territory was tripled and several service units were reopened or inaugurated. However, “although there are great efforts to reverse the situation, challenges remain”, warns the report, released on the eve of the United Nations Conference on Climate Change (COP30), which will be held in Belém (PA), with a strong focus on the Amazon.
Health
“It’s a very chronic and systemic cycle of illness, closely linked to the mining invasion. Firstly, as a Yanomami friend says, where there is mining, there is malaria and this makes families have greater difficulty in farming, because sick people cannot and cannot go hunting. This also leads to hunger and malnutrition which gets worse because there is greater destruction of the forest, because the noise of machinery it scares away hunting”, adds anthropologist Ana Maria Machado, one of the authors of the report.
Data from 2022 show that among the 4,245 Yanomami children monitored by the Food and Nutrition Surveillance service, more than half (2,402) were underweight due to malnutrition. In 2019 and 2022, malaria cases exceeded 21,000 among children up to 5 years old, a figure close to that accumulated over the previous ten years. In four years, 47 Yanomami children died from the disease, almost 7 times more than in the previous four years.
Respiratory diseases are another major factor in mortality, with 187 infant deaths recorded between 2018 and 2022. The most common occurrence is the evolution of simple flu syndromes, which affect the Yanomami more seriously due to low natural immunity, amid increased contact with miners and other people from outside, and greater circulation in cities. Many of these diseases are preventable with vaccination, but with the demobilization of health services, vaccination coverage of the Yanomami population fell from 82% in 2018 to 53% in 2022.
Mining is also responsible for the contamination of waterways by mercury, which continues to be used to separate gold, despite being banned in Brazil. A Federal Police report, carried out in 2022, pointed out that water samples from the Uraricoera, Parima, Catrimani and Mucajaí rivers have a mercury content on average 8,600% above the average considered acceptable for human consumption.
Even though the disintrusion of miners has already led to visible improvements in the rivers, “the colorless presence of mercury in the environment, in rivers and in fish will continue to be a source of contamination for several years”, laments the document. Mercury causes serious damage to health, mainly damaging the central nervous system. In children, it can seriously affect development and also cause fetal malformation and motor and neurological problems in babies.
Illegal groups also took advantage of the growing vulnerability of the Yanomami population and used money, weapons, alcohol and drugs to co-opt young Yanomami to work in mining, and sexually exploit the girls.
“There are numerous reports of cases of girls being abused in exchange for payment for themselves or their families. There are also cases of girls and women who frequent mining areas to prostitute themselves in exchange for food, in situations of obvious exploitation”, describes the report.
Way of life
The study Yanomami Childhood and Youth: What it means to be a child and the urgent challenges in the Yanomami Indigenous Land highlights that people under 30 years old make up around 75% of the population of the indigenous land, a proportion well above the average of 42% of the Brazilian population. This means that three out of every four Yanomami are children, teenagers or young people and demonstrates, in the researchers’ opinion, the importance of looking at this portion of the population that also presents diversity among themselves, with six different languages, for example.
Despite the worrying data, the report emphasizes that this period “is not limited to deprivations and challenges”, and is also marked by “freedom, autonomy and community participation”.
“In the forest, children grow up with their families – playing, accompanying their fathers hunting animals, their mothers collecting food, and observing collective meetings. Listening to and understanding Yanomami knowledge means being closer to finding answers with them”, highlights the document.
“The Yanomami have an idea that growing up in a community is also a way for children to be well taken care of, so they have a broad network of care that is much denser than what we see in the Western world. And freedom, the great autonomy that children have and free movement, are very specific points of Yanomami childhood. They do not have environments that are prohibited from accessing children and they learn a lot from each other or from adults, and are involved in a life of community”, explains Ana Maria Machado.
“This structure of Yanomami ways of life rests on a fine balance that can be disrupted by different influences, mainly from the non-indigenous world. We have this huge population that grows after the demarcation of indigenous land, called in the report the “demarcated land generation”, in this context of transformations arising from contact, with intergenerational conflicts and adaptations to the news that comes from the world of white people, good and bad”, complements anthropologist Marcelo Moura, who shares authorship of the work.
“The two fundamental objectives of the report are: first, that it is a timeless reference and a source of information research for those who work with the Yanomami and also that it can help organizations, managers, professionals from all areas to better understand the particularities of working with and for these populations (…)” concludes the head of emergencies at UNICEF in Brazil, Gregory Bulit.
The report points out that territorial protection, against mining and any other activities that threaten the forest and the indigenous way of life, is essential for the protection of the Yanomami people. It also calls on developers of public policies that work together with Yanomami associations and listen to children and adolescents, “trying to understand their desires and desires in a world of rapid and complex transformations”.
“It is essential that the great demand of these young people for schooling, for access to new knowledge and the use of new technologies, is taken seriously, especially as tools in the fight for respect for their dignity, for the integrity of their territory and for the right to preserve their culture and ways of life. They need to be guaranteed clean water, education and quality health care and safety, so that they can develop in a land free from invaders”, recommends the document prepared by the Unicef in partnership with the Hutukara Yanomami Association.
