British TV crew 'spread deadly flu to remote Peruvian tribe'

[Judi Lynn]

British TV crew 'spread deadly flu to remote Peruvian tribe'
By Nick Allen
Last Updated: 2:53am GMT 27/03/2008

A British production company making a reality television show in the Peruvian Amazon has been accused of starting a flu epidemic which allegedly killed four members of a remote native tribe and left many others seriously ill.

Indigenous communities blamed researchers from London-based Cicada Films for the outbreak in the isolated Matsigenka tribe where people had previously had little contact with Western diseases.
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Dr Shephard said: "I warned them specifically that their visit to the isolated villages of the Cumerjali could pose a health risk to the people there through contagion from a simple cold which could turn into virulent pneumonia.

"I was very surprised, even shocked, to learn that they intended to visit these remote, isolated settlements in initial phases of Western contact."

The crew left Yomybato on Oct 19 with a team of local helpers, he claimed. Dr Shephard said that on Nov 10 a man named Kian-Kian emerged from the upper Cumerjali to inform the people of Yomybato that the film crew had visited his community and that, allegedly soon after, four people had died.

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/03/26/nperu126.xml