The end of border closures imposed during the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a huge increase in new arrivals at the end of 2021. The number of Venezuelans who crossed the border surpassed 160,000 in 2022, more than in the two previous years combined*. This placed an additional strain on already overburdened local healthcare facilities.

As a result, we scaled up our response in the northern state of Roraima, assisting with the provision of general healthcare, health promotion, mental health support, and sexual and reproductive health services, by running mobile clinics in migrant hotspots, shelters and informal settlements in the capital, Boa Vista, and in Pacaraima.

We also provided medical assistance to indigenous communities from Venezuela in rural areas around Pacaraima. These migrants are particularly vulnerable, due to the barriers they face in accessing the public health system.

In the first half of 2022, we offered mental health support and training for communities affected by severe floods and landslides in Rio de Janeiro, Bahia and Pernambuco. With search and rescue activities covered by local authorities, we focused on increasing access to mental health support. Our teams trained health workers, as well as civil servants such as teachers, social workers and community leaders, so that they could provide psychosocial support to survivors of the disaster, and also create a long-lasting local capacity to enable communities to respond to such events in the future. 

*IOM: https://brazil.iom.int/sites/g/files/tmzbdl1496/files/documents/Informe_Migracao-Venezuelana_Jan2017-Dez2022.pdf