RIO GRANDE CITY, Texas — When labor pains signaled that Clarissa Muñoz was at last going to be a mom, she jumped in a car and headed two hours down the Texas border into one of the nation’s most dire coronavirus hot spots.
On America’s southern doorstep, the Rio Grande Valley, the U.S. failure to contain the pandemic has been laid bare. For nearly a month, this borderland of 2 million people in South Texas pleaded for a field hospital, but not until Tuesday was one ready and accepting patients. In July alone, Hidalgo County reported more than 600 deaths — more than the Houston area, which is five times larger.
This predominantly Hispanic region is cruelly vulnerable to COVID-19. The prevalence of diabetes here is roughly three times the national average, and households have among the lowest incomes in America, adding to the difficulty of thwarting the virus. At the hospital, a television monitor displays the struggle in real time: Teal rectangles represent occupied hospital beds, and green rectangles are open beds. The grid is nearly all teal. On a whiteboard, “body bags” is scrawled on a list of needed items.
One entrance to the hospital’s COVID-19 ward resembles an off-the-shelf patio door, the kind sold at big-box hardware stores. Last week, Alex Garcia, 26, visited his father by peering through the outside window of his room. Both men are pipeline workers. “This is great in Hartford, Connecticut, because everybody has a 4,000-square-foot home, the average income is $180,000 and all that. Down here, it’s very different,” said Dr. Efraim Vela, the hospital’s chief executive physician of women’s health. “We’re having problems with that.”
Trump, did you see or hear about the virus in Rio Grande valley, in Texas? Or is it one you discard for being non - important ?
Not following health recommendations to “own the libs”, then crying and upset when the libs were right.
'The virus is America's fault now!' Forget about the Wuhan research lab, the Chinese bluffing WHO, WHO bluffing the world. It's clearly Trump's fault.....
Pretty sure this is more proof that the hospitalnis wrong.
Corona ...... corona ....... corona ...... it is here to stay ...... we need to get on with life ...... you can die from lots of things ..... even driving your car ...... lockdown all the gas stations so we can’t drive and die ......
What country doesn’t have the same precautions right now?
Oh brother. Here we go again. When all else fails drag out the pregnant ILLEGALALIENS.
It looks as if the AP is now slanting the news. What's goin' on?
Go drop your spawn in a different country
Personal interest story intended to spread a political agenda point. Way to use childbirth for your political agenda.
Watch her still go vote for him.
Nah, just the US failure to better secure the border.
Yes it has.
... did not know. Thank you for reporting on the depth of the humanitarian crisis at the border. 💧
Fake news
This is absurd. Why cant they test the mothers before labor?
That is so sad, the most amazing moment ever is having your baby handed to you. How devastating to have that stolen.
Hey tedcruz JohnCornyn .. maybe you guys should focus on your own state instead of Joe Biden or made up defunding the police garbage. Remember the people who elected you to serve them? Why don’t you start?
This is sick, new babies need a mother's first milk for colostrum. All mammals do.
Send Covid victims over the Rio Grande and be done with it.
Oh that is heartbreaking!
Brown people don’t count here remember?
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