Expert Q&A
Honoring a Career Dedicated to Public Health

A Guatemalan national, García has worked at PAHO for 19 years, following a decade as a pediatrician in Belgium. PAHO Today recently spoke with him about his election to the academy and his career in public health.

How did you join the Royal Academy of Sciences of Belgium?
My relationship with Belgium dates back to 1979, when I traveled there to do a residency in pediatrics. Afterward, I stayed working as a pediatrician. In 1993, the Free University of Brussels awarded me a doctorate in clinical pediatrics. In all, I lived nearly nine years there, working hard at the hospital where I did my residency and in other health settings.This work earned me recognition from my colleagues. In this way, I was privileged to form personal and professional relationships with the cream of the crop of Belgian pediatrics. It was a few of these colleagues who decided to nominate me. I think it was all these circumstances together—plus the fact that I worked for PAHO—that influenced the decision.

What does this recognition mean to you?
It is the greatest honor I've ever had and probably will have in my life. When they told me the news last February…I realized that when one works for the satisfaction of a job well done—as so many anonymous workers in Latin America do—more than for a salary, the joy and pride of this kind of recognition is even greater.

What led you to dedicate your career to health?
My years as a student in Guatemala and my family origins showed me the hard reality of life for the great majority of people in developing countries and formed my social conscience and my commitment. I also think I learned a lot about transcendental human values from my parents, who opposed all kinds of injustice, especially social injustice. During my years working as a clinical pediatrician, I sometimes felt frustrated having to deal in the hospital with diseases that were totally preventable. That's why, when Dr. Ciro de Quadros invited me to work with PAHO in its immunization program and to participate in the eradication of such terrible diseases as polio, I didn't hesitate, because I see vaccines as a good example of how a health intervention can help reduce social inequity. I think dedicating oneself to public health is a good way to repay the social debt that all doctors in the Third World have toward our countries of origin, and which of course I have and I want to repay.

What do you feel is the main value of PAHO's work and mission?
I think PAHO's greatest strength, since its beginnings, has been the priority it has placed on primary health care programs in health systems. If we want to reach the Millennium Development Goals we should not lose sight of this focus. Of course, this includes vaccination, which has produced such major achievements as the eradication of smallpox and polio, the elimination of measles, and the control of neonatal tetanus in the Americas.

We must keep working on primary health care programs, focusing our efforts on the transfer of basic and appropriate technology to communities.We have to train community workers and empower communities to assume their role in the health process. We also have to support people and their communities in demanding health as an inalienable social right and, if possible, in recognizing and meeting their basic needs of water, food, shelter, education, sanitation…with growing emphasis on the environment and ecology. We have to encourage communities to mobilize on simple but basic things such as community epidemiological surveillance, which allows them to make diagnoses of situations, participate in decision making, and implement control measures.

What do you see as the top priority in the public health agenda today?
I think the priority continues to be achieving the Millennium Development Goals, and the top concern should be solidifying our fragile achievements in public health—such as reductions in infant and maternal mortality—so that they cannot be undermined by the evils and vices that currently plague our Latin American societies, of which corruption is the most pernicious. In other words, how to ensure the sustainability of the advances we have achieved and protect them from the ups and downs of partisan politics.