An image is worth a thousand words. We won’t be able to forget Lara Arregui’s photograph, lying on the floor of Hospital Iturraspe in Santa Fé, asleep, waiting for a bed that never arrived. Lara was a 22-year old diabetic, insulin dependent girl, unvaccinated. She was a veterinary student at “Universidad Nacional del Litoral. Paradoxically, Lara used to live in a city called “Esperanza”, which means “hope”. She probably hoped to get the vaccine, she hoped to be assisted and taken care of, she hoped to survive. But our public health system seems to be so overwhelmed that she didn’t get the required assistance. And she died, just like that. Hers was a death that could have been avoided. Like many other ones caused by the lack of vaccines in Argentina. Alberto Fernández’ administration should be held responsible for all these losses. Let’s bear in mind the vaccine line-jumping scandal, with so many people close to the government getting the vaccine at the health ministry. I don’t think they have a guilty conscience, though. Even after Lara’s death.
Irene Bianchi for Buenos Aires Times