Brazil has reported its first case of Covid-19 among the country's indigenous people who live in the Amazon, Reuters reported.

The patient, a 20-year-old woman, is a health worker from the Kokama tribe and is the first case out of Brazil's more than 300 tribes.

Unclear if she has symptoms

She was also reported by Reuters to have no symptoms although CNA reported that she had returned home with a fever, sore throat and chest pains, after travelling to several villages along the Amazon river.

She is currently in isolation with her family and is under observation.

Suspected to have caught Covid-19 from a doctor

Reuters further reported that she had been in contact with a doctor in the district of Santo Antonio do Içá, near Brazil's border with Colombia, who had tested positive for the virus during the previous week.

Brazil's indigenous health service stated that the woman was the only person to have tested positive, out of the 15 health workers and 12 patients who were tested after the doctor's positive result.

The doctor himself had returned from vacation in southern Brazil to work with one of the largest tribes in the Amazon, the Tikunas, who have more than 30,000 people.

Brazil's indigenous tribes fear extinction from Covid-19

The Guardian reported that many of Brazil's indigenous tribes fear extinction from the virus.

Ianucula Kaiabi, an indigenous leader in Brazil’s Xingu national park stated has stated that Covid-19 "could wipe us out".

A public health physician, Sofia Mendonça, who works in Xingu, echoed Kaiabi by pointing out how infectious diseases such as measles, smallpox and flu viruses have a record of wiping out significant numbers of indigenous people.

She warned: "We are talking about true genocide."

In addition, the community-based way of life for such people means that the transmission will be fast, with a high mortality rate, a member of the indigenous Kurripako people in Venezuela added.

The Guardian further highlighted that up to 90 per cent of the pre-Columbian population of the Americas -- estimated to be between 55 million to 65 million people -- may have been wiped out by outbreaks of smallpox and measles brought by Europeans.

Currently, Brazil has about 850,000 indigenous people, CNA reported.

Brazil has reported 6,836 Covid-19 cases with 241 deaths, according to Brazil's Health Ministry.

Top photo by MAURO PIMENTEL/AFP via Getty Images