“No olho do furação”: a construção projeto de isolamento social frente ao Covid-19, em um grupo indígena na Amazônia

Abstract

Here we expose this experience report, the result of a journey of five months of field research in the village Mapuera, where several indigenous groups live, generically called “Wai Wai Ethnicity”, in the city of Oriximiná, northwest of the state of Pará, because of the final phase of the doctoral thesis that is underway. Here we present the moments of distress and concerns experienced by the author of this report and native people in this place, in the first manifestations of the Covid-19 pandemic, here denominated “eye of the hurricane”, in March 2020. This experience leads us to the following question: How could an anthropologist help in the pandemic context that affects indigenous groups, especially in Mapuera? From that question, articulations were made involving the cacique chief, leadership, Mapuera Health Council, leaders of the local evangelical church, teachers and health professionals who provide service on the scene by Ovídio Machado Foundation, in front of the Guamá Tocantins- DSEI-GUATOC Sanitary District, focused on the development of a social isolation project. Until the first half of June 2020, moment of field departure, the referred project had not been used, since no case of Covid-19 had 1 Doutorando em Sociologia e Antropologia/PPGSA UFPA; Mestrado em Agricultura Familiar e Desenvolvimento Sustentável. Graduado em Ciências Sociais, com ênfase em Antropologia. Já foi bolsista do Museu Paraense Emilio Goeldi. É professor Efetivo da Universidade do Estado do Pará-UEPA, no Centro de Ciências Sociais e da Educação. Realiza estudos sobre povos indígenas, especificamente a saúde/doença/cura e participa de grupos de estudo credenciado pelo CNPQ e possui texto e orienta trabalhos sobre a temática mencionada. E-mail: ppotiguar@yahoo.com.br. 52 NOVA REVISTA AMAZÔNICA - VOLUME IX - Nº 02 - JUNHO 2021 - ISSN: 2318-1346 affected any indigenous in the place, but only reached some of them who were outside that space, as in the city of Belém, Santarém and Oriximiná, including death. Also news reports that, despite the non adherence to the “Social Isolation project” by the DSEI-GUATOC, its production served as a parameter for the development of a protection plan for the health team and the native people of the place, revealing one of the goals of this proposition: Inspire public policy actions in times of pandemic to protect indigenous peoples in the Amazonia, regardless of whoever they are.