18. Healing at the Border: Discussing the Medical Need at the U.S.-Mexican Border with Laura M. Vargas and Dr. Hannah Janeway from Refugee Health Alliance

Immigration Today!

On the 18th episode of Immigration Today! Angeline Chen introduces us to Laura M. Vargas and Dr. Hannah Janeway from Refugee Health Alliance. Refugee Health Alliance is an organization that was established in 2018 in response to the increasing medical need at the US-Mexican border. They aim to provide ethical, holistic, and culturally-sensitive healthcare to vulnerable populations.

Laura M. Vargas is one of the founders and co-directors of Refugee Health Alliance. She also works in Neurosurgery at a medical center and attended the University of Florida, where she dual majored in Neuroscience and Biochemistry and was a Division 1 Gymnast. Laura immigrated to the United States from Colombia as a child and is the first in her family in medicine. Her immigrant background has had a tremendous effect on the work she does. In this episode she shares a little bit about her background as a young immigrant being raised in America and how that affected her passion for helping those in need.

Dr. Hannah Janeway (they/them) is one of the co-founders and co-directors of Refugee Health Alliance. Dr. Janeway completed medical school at Brown University and now they split their time between Refugee Health Alliance and their work as an Emergency Physician. Their work focuses on re-envisioning healthcare spaces to serve the people who visit them, free from carceral forces, border health and border abolition. Dr. Janeway also shares a bit about their upbringing and how their interactions with the health care system made it apparent that there were great inequities that needed to be addressed.

Refugee Health Alliance began with a group of people responding to the health care needs of people at the border in 2018. At the time, more than 8,000 Central American migrants were arriving in caravans at the U.S. – Mexican border. As the need grew, RHA’s network of health care providers, students, volunteers etc. also grew. Eventually they became an official 501(c)(3) organization and now they have two clinics, Resistencia en Salud and Justicia en Salud. They focus on hiring local Mexican nationals or asylum seekers in order to ensure that the services they provide are holistic and non-hierarchal.

If you want to keep up with this amazing organization please visit them on their website here and social media pages on Facebook, and Instagram. Please consider supporting them through a donation here.

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