17/07/2020 The New Humanitarian | COVID-19 shifts Peru’s internal migration into reverse Fourteen days of quarantine turned into one and then two 25 years of journalism from the heart of crises Free Newsletter months. Chota Cora, a representative for the workers from Loreto – which became a COVID-19 hotspot – said people were desperate, and she accused the authorities of taking advantage of their situation. “They did whatever they wanted to with us,” she said in June. “We were tired of their lies.” She said that the rst of several protests took place after returnees did not receive drinking water for one week. Scardeoni said the ICRC requested access to the centre in May but has still not been able to visit. The Social Defence Institute, or INDECI, which oversees the transfer of the returnees, did not respond to requests for comment. Chota Cora said that after a month and a half in quarantine, 370 people from the Loreto group were taken to the airport. When COVID-19 tests carried out at the airport came back positive for 90 percent of the group, everyone was transferred to another site – the complex used for the Pan American Games – Chota Cora said.  The group spent another two weeks in quarantine, and families with mixed test results were placed in the same quarters as returnees who had tested positive. They nally all returned home the last week of June, Chota Cora said last week, speaking from Loreto. A year earlier, Chota Cora and her family had moved to Lima for a “better life”. In March, her husband lost his salaried job in a plastics company and their landlord forced them to leave when they couldn’t pay the rent. She tried to apply for government support online, but received automated messages denying her access to the application. Re ecting on her experience, Chota Cora said: “We have been badly treated – psychologically, physically – and they exposed us [to the coronavirus].”  pdd/js-il Read more about: Migration Life in limbo Coronavirus Peru Share this article Subscribe https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/news/2020/07/08/Peru-internal-migration-coronavirus 8/10