ElTiempo - Constitutional Court to examine health for indigenous people in Vaupés
- Sinergias
- Feb 13, 2017
- 2 min read

Magistrates to meet for two days in Mitú
The Constitutional Court will dispatch this week from Vaupés in the development of an appeal on the health of the indigenous communities of that department.
According to an order of the high court, a judicial inspection will take place tomorrow and next Tuesday in the community of San Miguel, in the Pirá Paraná area, and in Mitú, capital of Vaupés.
The proceedings will be conducted by magistrates Gloria Stella Ortiz, Jorge Iván Palacio and Aquiles Arrieta.
The tutela action was filed in October 2015 by the ombudsman of Vaupés, Carlos Javier Bojacá, against several national and departmental entities related to health issues in that region of the country.
The tutela argued that: “the indigenous population (of Vaupés) has been seriously affected because the late or non-existent health care has generated that, for example, ophidian accidents (or caused by snake bites) end in the amputation of parts of the body”.
Prior to the visit to Mitú, the Constitutional Court had requested opinions from several entities on the issue of indigenous health.
Two of them were the Legal Clinic of Environment and Public Health of the University of the Andes and the non-governmental organization Sinergias which, headed by its director, physician Pablo Montoya, recently sent the high court a 27-page document in which it provided an analysis for the judicial inspection and in which it highlights the lack of availability and access to health services by most of the population of the department.
According to official figures, Vaupés is a department with 42,000 inhabitants and 60% of them are considered indigenous.
There are a total of 27 communities, some of which are on the verge of physical and cultural extinction, including the Cubeo, Desano, Tukano, Bará, Barasana, Curripaco, Guanano, Jupda, Jujup, Kakua, Makuna, Piratapuyo, Pisamira, Siriano, Taiwano, Tatuyo, Tuyuca, Yurutí, Tanimuka, and Tariano peoples.
From: www.eltiempo.com
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