Peru
View MEDLIFE Projects, Peru in a larger map
Lima:
While Lima may be the largest and most modern city in Peru it is nonetheless stricken by widespread poverty, particularly in the rapidly assembled shantytowns on the outskirts of the city, known as pueblos jovenes. Unlike many of the other areas we serve, Lima contains many wealthy districts and popular tourist destinations. Shockingly, the extremely impoverished areas in which we work are often located no more than twenty minutes from these sites. Since 2010, MEDLIFE's work in Lima has focused primarily on the a set of communities known as La Nueva Rinconada, where more than 30,000 people live in conditions of extreme poverty. Characterized by a lack of development (including limited access to water and electricity), the pueblos jovenes such as these were first populated by an "invasión" of rural Peruvians who built homes on the steep, muddy, rocky hillsides surrounding Lima. Many came in search of a better standard of living and freedom from the violence that plagued rural Peru during the internal conflicts and near-civil war of the 1980s. Unfortunately, low wages, high unemployment, lack of attention from the state, and a myriad of structural and social obstacles have hampered their ability to realize these dreams. Quickly working to identify and resolve these issues, MEDLIFE has recently focused several Mobile Clinic campaigns and MEDLIFE Fund Projects in La Nueva Rinconada.
Cusco:
Although home to a burgeoning tourism industry and world-renowned as the historical capital of the Incan Empire, Cusco and its many surrounding communities are home to a large population living under the burden of extreme poverty. Access to MEDs is scarce for Peruvians living in the rural mountainside pueblos surrounding the ancient capital; roads are often unpaved and unsafe, schools are stocked with only the most basic teaching supplies, and the nearest hospital may be up to two hours away by car. As in the rural communities we serve in Ecuador, residents of Cusco and its surrounding territory strongly identify with the indigenous Quechua culture, and the economy relies heavily on farming and agriculture. And, as also seen in Ecuador, these industries consistently fail to deliver workers an income sufficient to care for their families' needs. Heavy rains and earthquakes frequently produce further hardships, as evidenced by the January 2010 flooding which wiped out roads, utility grids, and structures alike. Not spared from the destruction were many of the area's few medical clinics. Since 2009, MEDLIFE has served the Cusco region through Mobile Clinics and MEDLIFE Fund Projects. In 2010, MEDLIFE began work toward the construction of a new medical clinic that will replace a clinic lost earlier this year.
