Hunger in Guatemala

[Judi Lynn]

Hunger in Guatemala
Published: January 13, 2013

To the Editor:

Re “As Biofuel Demand Grows, So Do Guatemala’s Hunger Pangs” (news article, Jan. 6):

Three weeks ago, I returned from my first-ever medical mission to rural Guatemala, as a pediatrician for surgeons performing free cleft lip operations.

I went because of my Guatemalan patients here — to understand why their families undertake the harsh ordeal of undocumented life in the United States. What I learned still haunts me: Almost all the children we saw are too small, and many are developmentally delayed, from hunger.

The surgeons from Global Smile Foundation strove to provide the highest standard of quality and safety. Medical ethics demands no less for elective surgeries: mediocre technique or safety is no more acceptable in rural Guatemala than in Boston.

How, then, can we as a global public accept chronic starvation for millions of Guatemalan Maya children? If our policies deprive millions of children of food, we need to change them. Biofuels from food crops are ethically unacceptable, and driving up food prices through speculation is immoral.

More:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/14/opinion/hunger-in-guatemala.html?ref=opinion&_r=0

[Skittles]

1. .

[polly7]

2. Those poor children.

I've read Guatemala was once self-sufficient in corn production, until cheap foreign imports flooding the market shut that down, as with Mexico. Now this. It's horrible.