Traditional Indigenous territories are complex, adaptable, and resilient socio-ecological systems that contain the majority of the world’s biocultural diversity. But can Indigenous Peoples play a leading role in both combating climate change and preventing the next pandemic? Right now, there is a fair amount of rhetoric being flung about connecting, comparing, and contrasting the COVID-19 pandemic to climate change and the “sixth extinction” of biodiversity. In Indigenous worldviews—as well as in complex systems science—all these crises represent “maladies” caused by the profound unbalancing of our interconnected living planet. From his home in self-isolation in the Colombian Amazon, Koreguaje Indigenous leader Juven Piranga recently told me: “Our Elders agree that Mother Earth is causing this pandemic to clean the present state of the world, to rid us of the bad energies, and to counteract the pervasive greed and exploitation and disrespect. White people come here to our territories to exploit Mother Earth, for gold and timber and much more, and this affects everyone, and it is our responsibility to protect Mother Earth, so we are also punished. We need to reinforce our autonomy to stop these practices and restore balance.” While still not garnering nearly as much attention as it deserves, Indigenous Peoples’ role as partners in climate change mitigation is fairly well established in research, and gaining more attention internationally from both policymakers and the general public. The “Guardians of the Forest” paradigm recognizes Indigenous communities as stewards of the immense biodiversity and “ecosystem services” (or better, ecosystem functions) of tropical forests. Globally, the forested territories of Indigenous communities store at least 300 billion metric tons of carbon, above and below ground. Mounting evidence has shown that Indigenous communities with secure rights and tenure to their collectively held lands have extremely low rates of deforestation and land degradation. Additionally, while...