Since 2021, we have been focusing on our Mesoamerican nephropathy project* to strengthen the response to non-traditional chronic kidney disease. According to data from the Ministry of Health, there are more than 10,000 patients undergoing renal function replacement treatment in Guatemala – a country with one of the highest death rates from chronic kidney failure in the Americas (14 per 100,000). 

Our teams worked in three municipalities in Escuintla department, an area almost entirely given over to large-scale plantations. The main activities of the project are early detection, treatment, mental health and social support and palliative care. We also run health promotion and education activities to increase knowledge of the disease and promote prevention measures at community level.  

Guatemala is also a hotspot for migration flows in Central America. Thousands of people transit the country every day on their way north towards Mexico and the US, or returning to their home countries after being deported. 

In 2022, we sent two mobile teams to different sites in San Marcos and Huehuetenango departments, where we provided medical and psychological care, as well as health promotion and social support, to migrants. 

At the end of the year, we started to offer these same mobile services in Ciudad Tecún Umán, a city close to the border with Mexico, working at the bus station, the migrants’ shelter, and the centre for returnees. Like all MSF activities in Mexico and Central America, the project has a strong advocacy component, mainly targeting repressive US migration policies and calling for greater access to care, particularly mental health services, and protection from violence for migrants. 

*Mesoamerican nephropathy (MeN), sometimes also called chronic kidney disease (CKD) of unknown cause (CKDu) or CKD of non-traditional cause (CKDnT), refers to CKD that presents in young agricultural workers, primarily in Central America, in the absence of any clear aetiology.