Indigenous people 'worst-off world over'

[alarcojon]

A news story I hope many of us are interested in...

The health of indigenous people worldwide is much worse than that of other communities, even the poorest communities in the countries where they live.

This is among the findings of a major investigation launched by the medical journal The Lancet into indigenous communities.

The relatively poor health of aboriginal people in the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand has been well-documented.

But this study finds that indigenous communities are much worse off than other poor people in Asia, Latin America and Africa as well.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5019582.stm

[emcguffie]

1. I don't have too much to add to this,

-- except it is not spoken about nearly enough.

It's encouraging to see that The Lancet has actually cast an eye upon the subject.

[kaneko]

4. According to statistices for 2000

the average life expectancy for indigenous Austronesian
peoples of Taiwan is 10 years shorter for an indigenous  male
and 6 years shorter for an indigenous female,  compared with
overall figures for the population of Taiwan. 

[senseandsensibility]

2. kick

Please read this.

[Jara sang]

3. K & R

[IndyOp]

5. UN goals 'divert attention'

The biggest concern of the Lancet researchers, led by Dr Carolyn Stephens from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, is that the health of indigenous people does not register on world statistics at all.

The current priority in development funding is to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), targets set during the UN Summit in 2000. But the report says: "The MDGs could be achieved even if indigenous peoples disappear from our world."

Dr Stephens says the focus of the MDGs on "headline-capturing big numbers has an impact on indigenous peoples - both in terms of their international visibility, and in fund allocation".

<snip>

"Globally, indigenous peoples represent a demographic minority and they are amongst the world's most disenfranchised peoples," says the study. "Despite this, they have lived in and protected our most precious ecosystems and many of their ideas are vital to the survival of the ecosystem on which we ultimately all depend."

The authors quote approvingly the words of Mexican poet Octavio Paz: "The ideal of a single civilisation for everyone implicit in the cult of progress and technique, impoverishes and mutilates us. Every view of the world that becomes extinct, every culture that disappears, diminishes a possibility of life."

[alarcojon]

6. Kick for the Sunday matinee crowd

:kick: