Stories
The Long Walk to Help
In our daily life heroes can be found. However, they maybe would not look like the heroes in the movies. Up in the mountains in the Guatemala, an hour away from Patzun, Diego —a health worker— help people every week even when he does not wear a cape.
The elders from his community gave him the blessing to put his medical knowledge to the service of others. As most of the men in the village, Diego works in agriculture to bring food to his table. After his working day, he offers health assistance to the sick in the village. “People here seek for healthcare until they are sick enough to stop working”, said Diego.
In a remote place like this, health is a luxury. Diego knows this first hand. Sometimes saving a life escapes from his hands. A couple months before our visit Diego got a call a little bit later 10:00pm. A 9 years-old girl was very sick in another village. According to the person in the other end, the girl was burning in fever and a strong cough made difficult breathing. They thought Diego could offer only some directions by phone to help the girl but he decided to go.
This zone has no electricity, Diego walked in the darkness an hour and half to get there. After a quick physical examination, he knew was pneumonia. A shot of antibiotics and respiratory treatment could easily help her but he had none of these. Diego urged the community to get transportation to take the girl to the nearest clinic, which was located two hours away. Everyone around put some quetzales to gather the equivalent to $15 for the transportation, a fortune for families that make less than $100 per month.
They arrived to the clinic but they did not have antibiotics, neither a nebulizer. The staff there offered an ambulance ride to another medical center. “She died right in front of us on the road. Do you have any idea of how sad and frustrating that can be?”, expressed Diego with a mix of sadness and rage.
The beauty of the landscape in the altiplano maybe distract to its visitors of this harsh reality. Behind the awesome view there is poverty. In remote areas like this a medical device like CortinaNeb can literally means a life chance. People like Diego inspire us to create affordable medical devices that can save as many lives as possible.
