HEALTH TRANSITION AMONG AMERINDIAN POPULATIONS IN THE BRAZILIAN AMAZON

Most chronic health problems, such as obesity, for example, are associated with the transition from lifestyles linked to tribal livelihoods to urban city styles, and largely due to changes in diet and physical activity levels. The central problem of this paper is whether in the transitional situation in which the Amerindian populations of the Amazonian region of northern Brazil find themselves, the rates of overweight and obesity of the adult population would be an expression of the westernization and modernization of the lifestyles of these populations. The assumption is that this type of non-infectious disease would be more prevalent in localities with lifestyles closer to those of urban centers. And it would be less prevalent where indigenous traditional livelihoods predominate. The objective is, therefore, to present and analyze the nutritional profile of Brazilian natives aged between twenty and sixty years registered in the Food and Nutrition Surveillance System (SISVAN) database. From the methodological point of view, this is a descriptive research that uses bibliographic and secundary ethnographic research and official databases: data from the Food and Nutrition Surveillance System (SISVAN) and the Brazilian Institute of Statistics and Geography (IBGE).