In Brazil, health experts warn that Indigenous people are more vulnerable to COVID-19 than the general Brazilian population due to factors ranging from lack of consistent health care to their culture of shared housing and food. By August 2020, the rate of coronavirus deaths among Indigenous people in Brazil's Amazon was nearly 250% higher than in the general population, according to research by IPAM, the Amazon Environmental Research Institute.

Brazil's health ministry has said all rural Indigenous communities are part of a priority vaccination rollout.

But Indigenous leaders in territories not yet formally recognized by the government — such as the Karao Jaguaribaras — say their people are not yet receiving injections. Indigenous people living in cities also have not been included in the priority group, leaders say, which has left doctors worried they could carry the virus back to their home villages.

Data from the health ministry highlights the slower-than-expected pace of vaccinating the country's Indigenous people. As of March 4, about 213,000 Indigenous Brazilians had received a first dose of the vaccine since the program started in January. That is just over half of the 410,000 Indigenous people the government has said it intends to vaccinate in the priority group. According to Brazil's latest census, carried out in 2010, about 890,000 Indigenous people live in the country, more than a third of them in cities. That suggests only about half of the country's Indigenous population is in the government's priority group for the first round of vaccinations.

The government has said it intends to deliver more than 350 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine to Brazilians by the end of the year.

Read the full article about vaccinating indigenous Brazilians by Fabio Zuker at Thomas Reuters Foundation.