Japan Supports Yucatán With Telemedicine Equipment And Infrastructure Against COVID

The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), Mexico office, will provide specialized training and donate medical equipment to the Agustín O´Horán hospitals in Mérida and the General Hospital of Valladolid for up to US$5.7 million to better combat COVID-19 and help save lives.
General director of JICA Mexico, Keiichi Osato explained that the cooperation will be for 15 months and, among other things, the organization will donate a container-type intensive care unit for 5 beds with its respective equipment for the Mérida hospital and for the Valladolid hospital it will be medical equipment for six beds.
He reported that the purpose of the project is to provide training to medical personnel of these facilities through telemedicine between specialized doctors from Japan with doctors from Yucatán for 15 months.
An official in technical cooperation programmes of the JICA agency, Francisco Nicolás reported that the cooperation agreement was signed on Friday, July 23, 2021 with the Ministry of Health of the Government of the State of Yucatan and then the signatures will be collected with the Ministry of Foreign Relations and the Secretary of Federal Health and the equipment will begin to arrive in October for both hospitals and the container that will be installed in the O’Horán hospital will be ready in March of next year.
With the equipment and with the training and medical follow-up, the patients affected by COVID-19 will be cared for in a better way since the specialists from Japan will also be monitoring the sick and will give a second opinion and guide the local doctors.
He said that JICA Mexico is proud to cooperate with Yucatán because there is a long tradition of support for more than 100 years since Dr. Hideyo Noguchi arrived in Mérida to carry out studies on yellow fever, obtaining important results for international medicine.
In addition to Mexico, JICA also supports Indonesia, Toga, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Brazil, Kenya, India, and Senegal.