Baja California State University students bring food and medical aid to Kumiai Community

ALFREDO AZCARATE VARELA
THE BAJA POST/EDITOR

Community social service activities, which show the Baja California State University (UABC) “Longhorn Ram” students from the UABC School of Medicine, Mexicali campus, offered medical aid and delivered food, hygiene and cleaning supplies to inhabitants of the Kumiai community in San Antonio Necua, located in the Ensenada municipality.

A group of 98 students who will soon major in Medicine and Nutrition degrees participated, they delivered 98 pouches of basic food products, adding up to a ton of non-perishable food, in addition to 48 hygiene and cleaning packages that included a brush, toothpaste, toilet paper, bath soap, feminine pads, bleach, dish soap and mouth and face masks.

Fifty two people, 48 adult, 4 children, who were served by the Longhorns, also received medical guidance, and got their nutritional status assessed, anthropometry, measurement of blood pressure, peripheral glucose and rapid tests for HIV, syphilis and hepatitis C.

Activities coordination were overseen by Ximena Castillo Tovar MD and Dr. Gabriela López Almada, in charge of community social service, with the support and coordination of teachers of the subjects of Nutritional Anthropology and the Academic Body “Nutrition and Preventive Medicine”, doctor Daniela Guadalupe González Valencia and Dr. Vianey Mendez Trujillo and the medical community social service interns in medicine: Juan Pablo Paullada Bazua, Abril Angélica Escalante Villalba and the eighth semester student of medicine Julian Emir Palazuelos Sandoval.

This is the second time the students visit the Kumiai community, in 2020 they attended the Cucapá community, bearing a similar service to the community.

Students’ face-to-face participation was limited and in accordance with the recommendations issued by health authorities, so this activity sought to adjust and allow students to continue participating remotely in support of marginal and poor communities in the region, learning their story and traditions as well as bringing medical aid, food, medicine and other kinds of help.

It is really relevant for College students, such as the UABC “Longhorn Rams”, to be aware of the social commitment they acquire since they start studying in State universities, and Baja Salte students and professors have always been conscious of how much they owe to the State that gives them the opportunity to study college and/or attend graduate school.