Fires resulting from unchecked deforestation are poisoning the air millions of people breathe, affecting health throughout the Brazilian Amazon, the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM), the Institute for Health Policy…

Rural residents are being poisoned in Brazil from pesticides sprayed near their homes, schools, and workplaces. Many rural communities fear reprisals from wealthy and politically powerful farmers if they denounce such poisonings or advocate more…

Brazil has not addressed longstanding human rights problems that allowed the Zika outbreak to escalate, leaving the population vulnerable to future outbreaks and other serious public health risks. The government declared an end to the national public…

Thousands of patients with advanced illnesses in Guatemala suffer unnecessarily from severe pain because they cannot get appropriate pain medications. Guatemala’s drug control regulations – meant to prevent drug abuse – make it almost impossible for many…

(São Paulo, October 20, 2015) –The Brazilian state of Pernambuco has effectively turned over its vastly overcrowded prisons to hand-picked inmate “keyholders,” Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. The Pernambuco prison system holds more…