Hi everyone! Today was a very long but eventful day. We began the day by meeting with the speaking to the current deputy of health. Throughout the lecture, Dr. Daniel Ferrante gave us a unique insight on the challenges of his job. A major challenge in Argentina is implementing electronic ways of scheduling and accessing health records. Since Argentina is a developing country, it often struggles to keep up with technological advances and lacks the resources to develop them immediately. Understanding this perspective was interesting because for as long as I can remember, we’ve been using electronic scheduling for doctor’s appointments and always had access to our health records through apps. Throughout the past two days, I’ve learned a lot about healthcare in Buenos Aires. This city has many options and great hospitals to go to for care. However, Dr. Ferrante made it clear that Buenos Aires is exceptional- and the rest of Argentina unfortunately does not have all of these options. Many rural areas of Argentina only have one public hospital, whereas Buenos Aires alone has 34 hospitals.
After our visit with the deputy of health, we spoke to Dr. Luis Scervino about the Obras Sociales sector. Obras Sociales is Argentina’s version of social security. I learned that there’s national and provincial types of social security, along with social security strictly for retirees, military, and universities. Dr. Scervino stressed the importance of labor unions politically and culturally. Throughout history, Argentina citizens protested wages and other aspects of jobs. In fact, this actually was happening downtown in Buenos Aires today. These protests influenced the national government in the past by leading to the adoption of better worker laws. Labor unions also greatly unite employees because of their similar wants and needs. People want the best coverage and rights possible, which allows them to come together and stand up for themselves when change is necessary.
After the lectures, we took a bus tour to a few different locations in Buenos Aires. We first went to La Boca, which was the most unique place I’ve been to so far. La Boca (yes, it literally means the mouth), was a hub for immigrants in the 1900s. Many Italians immigrated here to seek better opportunities. In La Boca, there were many souvenir shops and other locally owned businesses. Fun fact: Diego Maradona played for the local soccer team Boca Juniors, and there were many murals of him around the neighborhood. While in La Boca, I bought my family some souvenirs and myself a Messi jersey. We also visited San Telmo, a very European-styled neighborhood nearby. I really liked it here because of the beautiful buildings and the variety of shops. We then ended our tour at the Plaza de Mayo. We saw the famous pink house, which is sort of the equivalent to the White House in the United States.
Today was my favorite day thus far. I really enjoyed exploring neighborhoods in the southern part of Buenos Aires. It’s so cool to experience a culture completely different from everything I’ve ever known. I can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings!
