Covid-19 in Indigenous Chiapas, Mexico: Questioning a Hidden Pandemic

Abstract

According to official sources, Chiapas has by far the lowest case rate and lowest number of reported deaths from COVID-19 per 100,000 of any Mexican state. However, the perception of little danger from the virus in Chiapas contrasts with the almost total lack of knowledge about what is happening in almost 2/3 of the state’s municipios (townships) where 40% of the population of 5.2 million lives, among them all of the rural indigenous population. Based on brief e-mail testimonies from inhabitants of 14 indigenous municipios, the virus did hit hard throughout the state’s indigenous regions from May through July with many deaths, although virtually none of them were recorded by the state government. The text offers some explantations for this lack of reportting, summarizes some of the responses of indigenous families and communities to Covid-19, and calls for careful surveying and oral histories of the pandemic once the danger lifts.