Course activities
- Students spend a day with zoonosis experts from the Texas Department of Health and the University of Texas School of Public Health. Rabies in coyotes has been a rising health concern along the border since the 1980s.
- Local biology professors familiar with the Rio Grande lead a daylong trip that
begins at the river’s tributaries and ends with the students up to their knees in the river, wearing hip waders and taking samples. Water pollution is a critical problem on the Rio Grande, which stretches along the border from El Paso to Brownsville. In 1994, the Laredo Health Department banned swimming in one stretch of the Rio Grande below Laredo after a 13-year-old boy died from meningitis caused by naegleria amoebae in the water.
Health fair: Students help at community health fairs,
and work side-by-side with nurses and doctors.
- A Laredo Health Department physician who specializes in treating tuberculosis takes the students to a clinic in Nuevo Laredo to compare treatments and facilities with those used in the United States. Tuberculosis and drug-resistant strains of TB are more common in border communities than other parts of the country.
- A Laredo herbalist takes students to see the native plants many people use, and explains their perceived value and common uses.
- Students visit the colonias, or unincorporated subdivisions, common near Laredo and along the border. Colonias often have no sewers or running water, and some have no electricity. Nearly 350,000 people live in colonias along the border in Texas. Because of poverty, their crowded conditions, and lack of sanitation, colonias are potential breeding grounds for disease.
- Parts of the course deal with air quality. Some students are involved in "environmental house calls," where students supervised by a physician visit the homes of children with asthma. The goal is to identify environmental triggers for asthma, and help parents improve home conditions.