Peru vaccinates communities of mythical Inca lake

Peruvian nurses took a boat across the famed Lake Titicaca on Wednesday in search of communities living on remote floating islands to vaccinate them against the COVID-19 virus.

Since July, the five health workers at the only health post on the lake have vaccinated their neighbours, but vaccination against the virus is progressing slowly despite their efforts.

Of the 1,200 people over the age of 18 living on the islands, only half have been vaccinated so far.

With a loudspeaker, medical staff announced the arrival of the vaccination boat to the islands while a nurse takes care of an ice-lined container of Pfizer pharmaceutical vaccines.

These communities are part of an ancestral and ancient people, as old as the Inca civilization, called Uros. Titicaca is also considered a mythical lake of the Incas and where the founders of the empire came from.

Although Peru has vaccinated more than half of its population of 32 million against the virus, the southeastern region of Puno, home of Lake Titicaca, is one of the least vaccinated regions in the country.

Peru's official coronavirus death toll stands at more than 200,000. It has the highest mortality rate in the world.