Survival International, an organization that champions tribal peoples around the world, reported recently on a measles epidemic that has hit Amazon tribe, Yanomami, on the Brazil-Venezuela border.


To date, 23 measles cases have been seen at the hospital since March and as Survival notes, the isolated tribe has little immunity and outbreak has the potential to kill hundreds of tribes people. The total number of people affected is still unknown.

Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said today: “When tribal people experience common diseases like measles or flu which they’ve never known before many of them die, and whole populations can be wiped out. These tribes are the most vulnerable peoples on the planet. Urgent medical care is the only thing standing between these communities and utter devastation.”

It is believed that the contagious viral disease was brought in by gold miners that have entered the region.

Brazil and Venezuela border is the last place in the Americas with river blindness
