Hello from South America!

August 27, 2008

Hello!!

I am finally writing as I am on the last leg of a long journey this summer. My classmate, Sara McReynolds, and I have been traveling throughout South America since June 1. Both of us are finishing up our Field Experience for our Master of Public Health degree. Our field experience was meant to introduce us to the international aspects of public health and to learn about disease eradication in developing countries.
We flew into Buenos Aires, Argentina and spent a week there taking intensive Spanish lessons. We explored the city and saw quite a bit of it! It is a beautiful city with a very European type atmosphere.


Left - One of the many beautiful buildings in Buenos Aires

Right - Plaza de Mayo and Presidential Palace

Our next stop was in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. There we attended the RIMSA Conference. RIMSA is an annual meeting where the ministers of both health and agriculture from all of the Americas meet. We met several veterinarians involved in international public health and made good contacts with them. We also were able to see the sights of Rio including Sugar Loaf Mountain, Christ the Redeemer, and Ipanema and Copa Cabana beaches.


Left - Sara and I at the trolley on our way to the top of Sugar Loaf Mountain
Right - We met a famous soccer player (even though we really have no idea who he is!)


Left - Sara and I in front of the Christ the Redeemer Statue

We had the opportunity to visit PANAFTOSA, the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO) center for the eradication of Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) in South America, located just outside of Rio. We met several important people there, including the Jorgen Schlundt, the Director of Food Safety, Zoonoses, and Foodborne Illnesses for the World Health Organization (WHO.)

The majority of our time was spent in Paraguay. Through the Partners of America Program, Kansas and Paraguay are paired up. Many Paraguayans study at Kansas universities. We stayed with Marcos Medina and his family. He is a veterinarian who studied at Kansas State for a Master’s Degree. Marcos, his wife Delia, and his sons Juan Marcos and Jose, were wonderful hosts. We always felt at home with them!


Left - Marcos, Jose and Juan Marcos with one of their Grandpa’s Santa Gertrudis bulls

Below - Sara and I posing with the guards in front of the Presidential Palace in Asuncion, Paraguay



Below - Sara, our tour guide (who coincidentally looks exactly like a former president of Paraguay) and I in the old congressional house in Asuncion


While in Paraguay we worked with SENACSA, the Paraguayan equivalent of the USDA. We learned all about their vaccination program to eliminate Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD). Paraguay right now is considered free of FMD with vaccination. This is very important because the European Union has just opened up their market to Paraguayan beef. It was interesting to see just how much international trade pushed the Paraguayan government towards elimination of FMD.

We also spent a month in the "wild" Chaco of western Paraguay. This are was settled by Mennonites from Canada and Russia in the 1930’s. Originally all of the Mennonites spoke only Low German but now most are bilingual speaking both Spanish and Low German. Luckily, most of them also know High German, which is what I learned in high school, so I was able to practice some German with them. Many people also come from Mennonite colonies in the US and Canada so there was a lot of English spoken.
Left - Necessary for vaccinating in the Chaco…a syringe gun and a real gun!!

The Mennonites are very organized and have made the uninviting Chaco one of the most productive parts of Paraguay. They have dairies, farms with cotton, soybeans, safflower, sesame and peanuts, and they raise a lot of beef cattle! Most of the cattle are Brahman or Brahman crosses. They also formed cooperatives early on and that has been a big reason for their success. The cooperative we worked with had a lot of Brahman - Santa Gertrudis crosses. We were both able to go on many calls with the veterinarians of the coop. We also did a study to determine the prevalence of antibodies against anaplasmosis, a disease spread by ticks that causes anemia. We drew blood from almost 500 cows and we became experts at drawing blood from the caudal tail vein!!



Drawing blood for our study

We are now traveling in Argentina, we’ll head to Mendoza tonight on a bus. On Sunday we visited Iguazu Falls which is just amazing! We’ll fly home on Sunday night. I will be in Nebraska for about a week and then Mom and I will drive to my new place of residence, Las Vegas! I plan to start working before the end of September. I will be renting a house and will have plenty of room for visitors!!
Joan