KUALA LUMPUR: After blocking the entrance to their village with logs, half the people of Jemeri fled into the surrounding forest in fear as the ...
KUALA LUMPUR: After blocking the entrance to their village with logs, half the people of Jemeri fled into the surrounding forest in fear as the coronavirus spread in Malaysia, infecting the first indigenous Orang Asli person.
Orang Asli are among the poorest and most vulnerable in Malaysia which has the highest number of infections reported in Southeast Asia.A three-year-old boy from a village just outside Cameron Highlands, a popular tourist spot, tested positive for the virus, the director-general of the Department of Orang Asli Development Juli Edo told Reuters.The village has been put under lockdown, along with another where an infection is suspected. It was unclear how the boy had become infected, Juli said.
Many are struggling to find food after their small income from daily sales of vegetable, fruits and rubber have been cut off, while some are fearful of going into towns to buy food because of concerns of catching the virus.The Orang Asli are vulnerable to disease because of factors that include poverty and malnutrition. Their reported poverty rate of over 30 per cent compares to the Malaysian average of 0.4 per cent.
Shaq Koyok, an activist from the Temuan tribe, said people from his village, about 60 km from the capital Kuala Lumpur, had blockaded themselves in.Indigenous populations around the world, in Australia, Canada and Brazil, have closed their borders to protect communities, as the coronavirus, which has infected more than a million people and killed some 52,000 globally, continues to spread.
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