THE 'HEALTH" BEHIND MINERAL EXPLORATION IN THE AMAZON
Health; Mining; Amazon
This thesis intends to unveil the system of mediations that shape the "health-disease process" under the veil of large-scale mining projects in a "rural community" in the Brazilian Amazon in the Lower Amazon mesoregion in the extreme west of the state of Pará , (border with the state of Amazonas). Through Case Study, Oral History Methodology and other data acquisition techniques with a qualitative bias (without disregarding the quantitative dimension), it takes as one of its bases the reports of members (directors) of the Association of Communities in the Region of Juruti Velho – ACORJUVE in Vila de Muirapinima collected through field research during the months of October, November and December 2020. The analysis is anchored in the perspective of Marx (1996), and of Marxist authors, according to which there is a social determination of the “health-disease process”. From this perspective, it is argued that the presence of the mining company in the location triggered a set of changes/transformations that condition/determine the way of being of “health” in loco, given the preponderance of its economic dimension over other social and production relations in the region. This preponderance is related to the current stage of capitalist development and the continuous conversion of the “Amazon” into a frontier of extractive exploitation in tune with the organic profitability of contemporary capitalism in crisis.