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Summary:
Healthcare workers are on the front lines of the Covid-19 crisis that continues to worsen in Honduras. This week, Honduran physicians delivered a strong message to North American and Honduran sweatshops. They are also protesting against the other pandemic exacerbating Covid-19’s impacts in the country: corruption
Transcript:
I know that the news is totally dominated by the Covid-19 pandemic and its possible that people are really sick of hearing about it. But today, I want to give you all an overview of what is happening with the Covid-19 pandemic in Honduras.
Covid-19 cases continue to rise. Public and social security hospitals are at full capacity including the main and largest public hospital in Tegucigalpa, Hospital Escuela (the teaching hospital) that reported on July 4th as being at 110% capacity. The largest, public hospital in San Pedro Sula is at 141%.
Covid-19 Situation
As of yesterday evening (July 9), Honduras has 26,384 covid19 cases and 704 people have died from the virus. The Honduran government reports this data but a lot of people are mistrustful and suspicious of it.
A few weeks ago, President Juan Orlando Hernandez (JOH) reported that he tested positive for covid-19.The Washington Post, the LA times, CNN and others media reported that JOH and the First Lady tested positive around June 17th. But because of the political situation and the lack of legitimacy of the government, few in Honduras believed it. Some called for him to seek treatment in the public hospitals instead of the fully stocked military hospital where he had the best medical team and supplies. On July 2, it was reported that JOH left the hospital and has recovered from the virus.
#WhereistheMoney? #DondeEstaElDinero
Today, I want to talk about the two pandemics that Honduras is battling: covid-19 and the corruption pandemic. Corruption has been going on for many years and is making the impact of the covid-19 pandemic even worse.
Honduras is going through another moment of outrage this week as corruption scandal after corruption scandal is revealed. The outrage centers on the $749.2 million dollars approved by Congress or loaned by international institutions to directly manage the Covid-19 pandemic and the public health response.
(Note: This $749.2 million was approved in the first three months of the pandemic and does not include money that goes indirectly to support Honduras or international loans that were already approved before the pandemic started)
Hondurans are using the hashtag: #DondeEstaElDinero” or #WhereIsTheMoney – painting it on the side of their cars, on protest signs, and graphics circulating on social media.
Honduran physicians and healthcare associations have become some of the most vocal groups against corruption. This is likely because they live, see, and breathe the impacts of corruption as they attend day-to-day to Covid-19 patients in hospitals and clinics around the country. This week, physicians took on the powerful sweatshop industry.
North American Sweatshop Companies in Honduras
One of the epicenters of the pandemic is the northern San Pedro Sula region, right where all the foreign and Honduran owned sweatshops are located.
This is the main location of most foreign owned sweatshops. This includes production plants for U.S. apparel company Delta Activewear, Hanesbrand, Pride Manufacturing, VF Corporation (which supplies brands like Timberland, Vans, etc) and also Gildan Activewear. Some of these companies have multiple factories and are housed in special Import Processing Zones (ZIPS by the Spanish acronym).
Gildan Activewear is based in Montreal, Canada. It’s publicly traded on the Toronto and New York stock exchange. Delta Activewear is located in Greenville, South Carolina and also traded on the NY stock exchange. Fruit of the Loom is a parent company of multiple brands like Russell Brand, Jerzees, Spalding and more. Fruit of the loom is owned by Parent Company, Berkshire Hathaway, owned by U.S. billionaire Warren Buffett. Berkshire Hathaway is the 8th largest publicly traded company in the world.
These factories are making clothing apparel: T-shirts, underwear, basic, plain clothing. There are other factories producing other goods like car parts as well, for example, the Lear Corporation, which operates in Cuidad Juarez in Mexico and has had serious issues with Covid-19 infection outbreaks inside their factories there.
“Close the sweatshops or we close down the hospitals”
When the Honduran government started the “intelligent reopening” of the country in late June, the sweatshops were allowed to reopen under the condition that they did not operate at capacity and implemented bio-security measures.
So while the infection rates skyrocket in Honduras, the “intelligent reopening” started, and the foreign and national owned sweatshop called their workers back.
But Honduran physicians have said: “NO, NO WAY. we can’t work in dire conditions in the hospitals while sweatshops are free to operate, call their workers to work and thus spread the virus.” They logically but boldly because of the economic and political power of the sweatshop industry in Honduras, proposed to close the sweatshops down.
In fact, some leaders of the Honduran Medical College said “shut the sweatshops down or we, the doctors will shut the hospitals down”
Here is a report by Honduran media station, UNETV outlining the physician’s position on the issue in northern Honduras. Then you will hear UNETV’s interview with Dr. Samuel Santos, the Vice President of the Honduran Medical College in northern Honduras in a press conference on July 5th:
UNETV journalist: “The proposal is the total closure of the municipalities for 3 weeks including the sweatshop industry that have been given permission from the government to operate, but is where many cases are concentrated – this is where the number of cases are multiplying according to what the Medical College is saying in this meeting here in San Pedro Sula. Let’s listen to the proposal by Dr. Samuel Santos”
Dr. Samuel Santos: “San Pedro Sula, Villanueva, La Lima, Choloma, Progreso, Pimiento, Porterillos, Quimistan, is where the sweatshops are concentrated. It is where there are more than 17,000 people working and producing 30% of the covid19 cases. They are not closing the sweatshops because when a worker gets sick in the sweatshops. The companies immediately contract another person to take over the infected person’s work post. For these reasons, we are demanding the closure of the areas where the sweatshops are.”
This was a pretty strong statement and it caused a stir in Honduras. Dr. Samuel Santos even said that physicians would close the hospitals if the sweatshops weren’t closed down.
Honduran Women’s Collective (CODEMUH)
I asked Maria Luisa Regalado of the Honduran Women’s Collective (CODEMUH) about the Honduran Medical College’s demands to close the maquilas. CODEMUH works with Honduran women employed in the maquilas and focus their work on occupational health.
I really like CODEMUH and its work. They have offices in two different cities (Choloma and Villanueva) where there are a lot of maquilas. On their days off (pre-COVID19), sweatshop workers went to their offices to hang out, sit and discuss the issues they face as workers, receive workshops about women’s rights, occupational health, etc.
I’ve been in both of their offices. The women are so welcoming and warm and they take care of one another. When a worker is fired because she developed an occupational health issues inside the factories, she loses an essential, if not, her only source of income.
I did my Masters studies with CODEMUH. I spoke to many women and heard their stories about what led them to work in the sweatshops and also began to understand just how much these companies take advantage of poverty. The more a worker fights for their rights, the bigger the threat they are to the company, and the company finds so many ways to fire them. The threat of losing your job in Honduras is an overwhelmingly powerful deterrent to denouncing what’s going on … and the foreign companies know this.
The bosses will actually say – “if you don’t want to do that then there are lines of people outside the factories waiting for a job that will.” Jobs are hard to come by in Honduras. Thats why CODEMUH says, “we want jobs, but we want jobs with dignity.”
CODEMUH takes on battles that publicly seem like one worker’s rights, but that behind the scenes is not only trying to get that woman’s job back. Instead, its about supporting her through trauma of rape, abuse, and/or extreme poverty. Each case is different.
This is Maria Luisa Regalado in an interview. She began by talking about the Honduran government’s efforts to coordinate an “intelligent reopening” of the economy in late June:
Maria Luisa: “Then the “intelligent reopening” started and only 20% were going to open but what we understand is that 90% of the working population in the factories were already working. Many of the workers that we work with are sick with serious problems related to coronavirus.
On the one hand, the maquiladora companies are not implementing security measures and there is no supervision by the authorities. To start, the Ministry of Labor, since March 15, closed its offices and the offices remain closed.
Workers have suffered serious violations to their rights and there aren’t places where they can go to denounce these abuses.There have been terrible violations of their rights. The maquila owners have done whatever they want, and they know that there aren’t any authorities that can oversee or supervise what these companies are doing.”
Sweatshop Companies Respond to Workers Getting Sick with Covid-19
I asked Maria Luisa if workers are in fact getting sick and if so, how are these U.S. and Canadian companies handling it when workers get sick with Covid-19:
Maria Luisa: “We are constantly receiving complaints from workers that insist they have symptoms of the coronavirus – headaches, fevers, body pain – a bunch of problems. And they tell their immediate bosses and they aren’t sent home. Sometimes they are giving acetaminophen and sent back to work.
There have been cases where a worker gets very sick and sent home but there isn’t any public transportation. So they have to figure out how to get home. Its a difficult situation and this is putting them at high risk.
There have been pregnant women that are working in the factories. There was one case of a worker that the social security hospital sent home to quarantine. Then the company called her and told her she had to get back to work even though she hadn’t finished her quarantine. She told them she was told she had to quarantine. They told her to come into the factory and that the company’s doctor would evaluate her.
How is it possible that a worker told to quarantine by the social security hospital because she’s positive for the coronavirus, be called into work? This means that her health is at risk and also all the people that work in the same factory.
We are very worried and not just us, but also the medical association and the Honduran Medical College. They did a press conference to call on the government and public health authorities to suspend and close the maquiladora industry.
The problem with not shutting down the maquiladora industry, according to the doctors, is that we are going to see a catastrophic situation in two weeks. They assured that 30% of the population receiving medical attention in the social security hospitals come from the maquiladora industry. Not just in Choloma but in Santa Barbara. The governor of Santa Barbara said the same thing. That 30% of people going to the hospitals in Santa Barbara come from the sweatshops.
So how it is possible that the authorities aren’t doing something about this? It means that if there is a high level of infection, it’ because there aren’t bio-security measures and that’s what the workers are telling us. Many say that the companies aren’t respected prevention measures and that the human resource office aren’t trained in bio-security measures, let alone the rest of the working population.”
I know these horrible working conditions in the context of the pandemic are playing out in the U.S as well. There are big companies operating in different parts of the U.S. that are doing the same to their workers. And its a major problem.
But its a different context in Honduras – there really aren’t any recourse for Honduran workers – the justice system doesn’t work and foreign companies have a lot of power for a variety of reasons. I will definitely touch on these issues in a later episode.
To stay focused on how the pandemic is unfolding in Honduras, lets talk about the healthcare system. Doctors have become the most vocal not just about the sweatshop industry, but against the government, its management of the crisis, and the horrible conditions inside the hospitals and Covid-19 treatment centers.
Healthcare System Has Collapsed
As Honduran hospitals collapse and an increasing number of healthcare workers fall ill and die from covid-19, Dr. Suyapa Figueroa, the President of the Honduran Medical College explains the dire situation of the hospitals on July 6th in a press conference in Tegucigalpa. This situation will keep on getting worse:
Dr. Suyapa Figueroa: “The healthcare system in light of its ineffectiveness, is practically not working. In reality, our colleagues in healthcare, about 40% are withdrawing from work because they are sick, they have pneumonia or Covid-19. A large amount of personnel. If we continue in this situation, there will be a bigger collapse of the healthcare system. People won’t be dying even at the doors of the hospital but they will die at home because the system collapsed days ago. The authorities haven’t done anything to alleviate the situation and the healthcare system is really serious.”
Watch full press conference in Spanish here
In another interview, Dr. Figueroa talks about why she thinks certain businesses are being closed during the pandemic and others, like the big supermarket chains and the sweatshops aren’t. Dr. Figueroa speaks to the Honduran press outside a hospital in Tegucigalpa:
Dr. Figueroa: “Its without doubt that you can’t open the economy just to favor the privileged or the groups that are always favored in this country. But they close the street markets – but why don’t they close the supermarket chains? Because they are owned by the economically powerful, the people that really run this country. But the people that need to sell and buy in the street markets, no, they make them close. And they close them in the worst way possible, through pressure, sending the military in, throwing tear gas at them, but why don’t they close the big supermarket chains in the same way? This is the big question … who really runs this country?”
Watch full press conference in Spanish here
It’s pretty amazing when doctors, and not just a few here and there, but like entire associations take the side of the people. It’s rare to see that in the United States and Canada. The awareness of Honduran doctors of the suffering of the majority for years has turned the doctors against the government, who continues to refuse to actually work with the Honduran Medical College to deal with the crisis.
Pictures and videos are circulating of the public healthcare system.The Honduran government purchased military style tents to place outside the hospitals as treatment centers and overflow patient areas. Some of these tents don’t have walls and when it rains, patients get wet as they lay on thin mattresses next to flooded streets. In these hospitals, people have to largely rely on their families to purchase the things they need – medications, food, and possibly even oxygen tanks if the hospital runs out.
Corruption and Healthcare in Honduras
Corruption and the international support for this corruption has been a long-term problem especially in the healthcare system well before Covid-19.
Lets hear again from the President of the Honduran Medical College, Dr. Figueroa who focuses on the Honduran government’s role. Then I’m going to connect it with money that’s been given to the Honduran government since Covid-19 started. This Dr. Figueroa speaking to Honduran press in Tegucigalpa:
Dr. Figueroa: “They have definitely treated the funds destined to attend the emergency like a pinata, that in this moment, thanks to the lack of attention, thanks to the acts of corruption, thanks to the delay in the purchasing of supplies, to the fraudulent purchases, people are dying in the treatment tents, and they are dying in the most inhumane and degrading manner that could ever exist.
There are long lines at the INFOP emergency treatment center and all places that have been designated to attend to patients where there isn’t even basic supplies to assist my compatriots that go there for help.
They are really disgusting, the people that stole the funds definitely don’t deserve anything else except to be in jail. To be exhaustively investigated by IMPARTIAL people but unfortunately we don’t even have that in the justice system in this country.”
“Right now, no one can guarantee anything in this country. Absolutely nothing. If you come to a treatment tent, you aren’t going to find oxygen or anything. If the government puts up another tent, which is just a show, you’re not going to find the supplies. Look at the INFOP treatment center … the system collapsed there this weekend. Even if you have money, you won’t be able to access a hospital right now. Even if you have medical insurance or the money you need, you won’t receive attention.”
Watch full interview in Spanish here
International Support for Corruption
Lets zoom out a bit. Dr. Suyapa makes it clear that the corruption and awful conditions of the healthcare system have been problems that have gone on for a while. She also says that the justice system doesn’t work and doubts that corrupt officials will be held accountable or be investigated.
It’s really important to understand that this has been going on for a very long time. In fact, the corruption scheme seems endless and just pile onto years of more corruption.
And the U.S. and Canadian government knows this. The International financial institutions know this. And they keep sending money and politically and financially supporting the government.
U.S. Government Certifies Honduras on Tackling Corruption
In late May, the U.S. State Department certified Honduras which means continuing the flow of millions of dollars to the government. To certify Honduras, the State Department through the Deputy Secretary of State, Stephen Biegan, signed a document that said: “I hereby certify that that the central government of Honduras is: a) combating corruption and impunity including prosecuting corrupt government officials … “
This is simply untrue and everyone knows it. And it’s not just a problem that started, like I said, it’s been an on-going problem for several years and it’s from the top all the way to the bottom of government institutions.
So how much money has the International financial Institutions given to the Honduran government since Covid-19 started?
International Support to Corrupt INVEST-H Government Institution
A lot. Roughly $750 million in the first three months in access to loans (not available before Covid-19) and financial support that goes directly to the healthcare system to combat the pandemic. This total doesn’t include money given indirectly to respond to the virus (such as financial support for small businesses, etc) or donations.
Some of the World Bank’s budget comes from your tax dollars. The U.S. and Canadian governments assign millions of dollars to the World Bank to loan to countries like Honduras.
And that’s what the World Bank does. In fact, $20 million dollars that the World Bank loaned to Honduras to handle the Covid-19 pandemic, was put under the management of the government institution called the Honduran Strategic Investment Office or INVEST-H by its acronym.
Now in Honduras in the last few months, INVEST-H has been the subject of a few huge corruption scandals involving millions of misspent public money. Most of the corruption scandals are related to purchases of medical supplies for Honduran hospitals.
It was found that INVEST-H paid $2.35 million dollars extra – EXTRA – as part of overvalued contracts to Honduran medical supply companies.
What was INVEST-H buying? N-95 and disposable surgical masks.
INVEST-H purchased the masks from Honduran medical supply companies owned by family members of the National Party and National Party Congressional representatives.
So, INVEST-H basically GAVE $2.3 million dollars in public funds to a few companies using overvalued contracts. And INVEST-H is the government institution that the World Bank and other international financial institutions are giving money to.
The World Bank knows better than anyone who they are doing business with. Yet, they continue their support, their financing, and their presence in Honduras. And they have done so for years. They are a huge part of the corruption problem.
So while Honduras incurs public debt from these loans, Hondurans are dying on the sidewalks outside the public hospitals system that doesn’t have the capacity, the supplies, the medical personnel, the infrastructure, or the political will to manage the crisis.
While things get more and more difficult in the country, without a doubt, it’s hard to stay positive and hopeful. The situation is bad.
But ike the Honduran physicians, the social movement keeps making demands and protesting in the ways they can. The doctors are organizing caravans to make it known that they are not in agreement with what’s going on.
All the music I used today is from the lovely and talented Honduran singer, Karla Lara. To listen to Karla’s music, visit her Youtube channel here