United Nations Permanent Forum On Indigenous Issues

Third Session – May 19^th, 2004

 

Agenda Item 4 (c): Health

 

Aquechewa, honorable and distinguished members of the Permanent Forum, Member States, Indigenous brothers and sisters

 

My name is Rev.RaDine Amen-ra of the Foundation of Indigenous Americans of Anasazi Heritage.

 

The Anasazi people or Amerindians of North America represented by the several ethnic groups, however it is an ignored, but undeniable fact the largest population of Amerindians in North America ethnic identity is represented by brown – black skin with wavy to extremely bushy hair. Upon discovery of the Anasazi people, there existed a civilization with over 500 nation/states, a population of over 150 million people, and a tremendous matriarchal culture, with an average family size of 10-21 offspring per women.

 

The original name to represent the descendants from the women of Amerindians was Anasazi. The name Anasazi was replaced by the term Negro by colonizers, in their effort to destroy and rape the Anasazi women of their human rights to be respected for their ethnic identity, and right to live as a viable race on their land.

 

Today I take this opportunity to be a voice for the millions of Amerindians representing Anasazi heritage, and let their unspoken expression of spiritual, emotional, and physical suffering from generations of dehumanizing violations. Over the last 500 years – present, the enormous impact of colonization from generations of systematic discrimination, institutionalized racism directed towards them. Anasazi descendants from the original heritage represented by Negro women have been surviving through a holocaust of magnanimous proportions. These violations ranging from being deprived the human right to Ethnic identity, the right to sustain our heritage in our land, intellectual property theft of our heritage, including DNA harvesting from the afterbirth of Anasazi children by bio-genetics engineering corporations, forced assimilation into a false identity for belonging to our heritage homeland; which maintains our invisibility and dis-respect of our human rights.

 

Anasazi women have to struggle to continue their bloodlines. Today the effects of mis-education of the Anasazi children, racism, and environmental ethnocide. The Anasazi people are ignorant of the essential knowledge needed for self preservation to sustain the viability of their heritage belonging to the Amerindian race in our only homeland called Americia. If action is not taken to correct the human rights to ethnic identity and connect the people back to the knowledge to sustain there life within there indigenous heritage culture and international action taken to address the issues of environmental destruction contribution to the deterioration of the health and viability of the Anasazi people. The result will be the complete extermination of the original heritage descendants or Amerindians in the next 50 years. Today the effects of systematic destruction of Anasazi families are evident through the CDC statistics revealing the consistent increase of diseases effecting Anasazi people. Anasazi people have the highest morbidly rates for infant portability, communicable and non communicable diseases in the United States.

 

In lieu of the critical health care crisis facing Anasazi descendants, we respectfully reiterate the following recommendations made by the Second Session of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues

 

1. We recommendation 81 from the Second Session of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues which asked the Working Group on Indigenous Populations to undertake a study on genocidal and ethnocidal practices perpetrated on Indigenous People and request that you add ecocide to the study to look at the effects of environmental genocide on indigenous peoples. We recommend that a research study be undertaken to examine the effects of stripping the environment of vital organisms such as trees on the overall health and wellness of indigenous peoples.

 

2. We support the recommendations made during the Second Session of the Permanent Forum under the mandated area of Health Section 1a which urges the World Health Organization (WHO), the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and all United Nations bodies and agencies involved in health programs to incorporate indigenous healers and cultural perspectives on health and illness into their policies. In spite of all the technological advances in science and medicine in the US Anasazi descendants are mistrustful of the medical system and continue to utilize traditional indigenous and alternative healers to supplement their health care. We also support recommendation no. 2 which calls for UN agencies to convene a workshop on indigenous health with emphasis on indigenous women and children, infant mortality, reproductive rights, sterilization, domestic abuse and addiction and collecting data related to these issues.

 

3. We support the general recommendation made during the Second Session of the Permanent Forum under the mandated area of Health section 68 which urges outlining a global strategy on health of marginalized ethnic populations, to gather data and extend program services to indigenous people based on criteria relating to ethnicity, cultural or tribal affiliations and language.

 

4. We support the recommendation made by the Second Session of the Permanent Forum that the Global Fund review their funding strategy in order to include access by indigenous non-governmental organizations and health providers for community-based culturally appropriate HIV/AIDS programs.

 

5. Finally, we agree that a healthy population is a central goal of human development. We recommend support the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation, in paragraphs 53 and 54, under Health and Sustainable Development which stresses the need to address the causes of ill health, including environmental causes.