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Hello everyone.

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My name is Roberta Duarte.

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I'm a senior at Mount
Holyoke College,

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and I self-designed my major
in global public health

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with a concentration in
social behavioral science.

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And today, I'll be
talking about my summer

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internship in South America.

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So this internship took
place in Asunción, Paraguay.

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I was an assistant for a public
health project coordinator,

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and I got this internship
through the Ministry of Public

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Health and Social Welfare.

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This internship-- there
wasn't really this position,

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so I had to negotiate with
the Ministry of Health.

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So the reason why I
want to go into Paraguay

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is because I was raised but
I designed my major here,

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and I had this
whole idea of what

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public health means in the US.

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And then my sophomore
year, I went abroad.

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I went to Costa Rica, and I
had this global perspective

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what public health
was in that country.

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So being passionate
about this field,

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I wanted to go back home and see
what really means public health

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there, and if I want to
go back home and pursue

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that field there.

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So thanks to SENEPA, the
National Malaria Eradication

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Center, the Regional
Hospital of Luque,

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and the National University of
Asunción School of Medicine,

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I was allowed to do this.

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So I'm going to start
talking about SENEPA.

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So SENEPA is the National
Malaria Eradication Center.

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It was established in 1950,
and by then, the country

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was 90% infected with malaria.

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So that's how this
was established.

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And it wasn't until
the '70s that they

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started looking into other
vector-borne diseases

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like yellow fever,
Chagas, and dengue fever,

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which was most of what
I was focusing on.

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And this is the headquarters--
we have 18 offices--

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SENEPA [INAUDIBLE]
headquarters, and that

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is where I did most
of my training,

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and especially with a
focus in field work.

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So as you can see
here, my pictures,

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I was going from city to
rural cities in the nation

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and collecting
[INAUDIBLE] samples

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to take later to the laboratory
and see if these [INAUDIBLE]

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were infected and if that
population was at risk

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of getting dengue fever.

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I was also going house to house,
and it was OK, [INAUDIBLE]

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prevention.

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Just getting flyers,
we'll go house to house.

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If it was an epidemiology
perspective of the prevention

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that we were trying
to do, I would

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go like one house per block
or two house per block.

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So it was really
interesting because I

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had no idea how this field
work actually worked.

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And just also educating
land owners and house

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owners of what is dengue fever.

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Dengue fever has been in the
country for 15 years now,

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and it's been from dengue 1
to 4, so it's been mutated,

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and it's a big
[INAUDIBLE] in Paraguay.

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So this is the portion
where I actually

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did most of like an
office experience,

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and it was in the epidemiology
department at the Regional

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Hospital of Luque.

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This was one of the biggest
hospitals in the nation.

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So there's 18 sanitary
districts in Paraguay.

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This is number 11.

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And in this hospital, we
were in charge of 56 dams.

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So I was required to take
an epidemiology course

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for this portion
of my internship.

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And I took a 600 level at
UMass-- a graduate class

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where I was exposed
to many softwares

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and just what
epidemiology is in the US.

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And so I was really excited to
actually go back to Paraguay

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and implement
whatever I learned.

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Ended up being like a
totally different world.

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You know, from
computers to software

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to all these textbooks.

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I ended up having a lot
of papers, maps, notebooks

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that were [INAUDIBLE].

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And there was literally
not much I could do.

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I was shocked.

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But I mean I helped
as much as I could.

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And as I mentioned
in my abstract,

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I also had this nutrition
aspect of my internship,

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and that's when I was
working in this office.

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So this was my office.

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We had four tables, one
computer-- my boss's computer,

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and there was a nurse
in this table that

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was in charge of the nutrition
program in that region.

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And it's interesting--
one people per program.

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And this is like 56 towns
that we were looking at.

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So I was working with
a nutritionist-- going

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to schools, negotiating if
we're [INAUDIBLE] just work

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with parents, or
with the community,

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or with just the teens,
or the professors.

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So that was a really cool and
different experience as well.

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So that's more like epidemiology
[INAUDIBLE] experience.

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And then I mentioned that
National University of Asunción

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School of Medicine.

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And this portion
of my internship

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was, I wanted to know
what public health means

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in the academia field.

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So I want to know what
people were learning

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about public
health, and who were

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learning about public health.

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And end up being that
public health is just

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a graduate program.

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They don't have undergrad.

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We barely have it in the US.

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It's just a recent field.

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That's why I'm
deciding my major here.

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But it ended up being that now
it's required for doctors--

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any professional that wants
to carry a leadership role,

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they have to have a public
health degree to do that.

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So this was really cool, because
I was comparing the data,

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and it allowed me to see
exactly what's going on

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and network with professionals,
doctors, professors,

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and see their perspective,
what's going on,

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and I should do next.

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So overall, I did analyze,
implement, and promote

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new and creative solutions
to address dengue fever

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and nutrition challenges
in the country,

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but there were definitely
advantages and disadvantages--

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I can talk for hours about
them, but two really big ones

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that I will never
forget, it's the politics

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that I had to face.

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So advantages of politics
were, OK, well, I was at a time

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where there were a lot of
people running for mayor.

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There's a lot of money being
put in those campaigns,

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and I was in that moment
where it's just really hectic.

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And I realized,
like, OK, this is

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a time where I'm experiencing
one of the biggest moments,

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and I can take that
for future reference.

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And then disadvantage
was we couldn't do much

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because things were
stopped by politicians,

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or, OK, my director
was from this party--

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we can't implement
this other option

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because the doctor's from
a different politic party.

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So it was really interesting
to have that perspective.

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And then [INAUDIBLE].

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This was there over the
summer, and a lot of things

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changed thanks to his visit.

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There was a lot of new
public health programs.

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Hospitals were really
organized because having

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such a personality in
the country that was was

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[INAUDIBLE] made us
change a lot of things.

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But a disadvantage was I was
raised throughout my career

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life in the US.

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And I'm really used to
calendars and today's this,

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and tomorrow's that,
and 7:00 PM is 7:00 PM.

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There were days I would
get ready to go to work

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and the roads were just closed.

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I couldn't go.

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We didn't know
what-- it was like--

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I never experienced
being in a war,

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but I feel like it was being
in a war, because I couldn't

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leave my house,
things were closed,

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and no one knew exactly why.

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So that was kind of a
disadvantage to actually make

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things happen on time.

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But overall, I
accomplished my goal.

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I understand what
public health is.

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I know that I'm not going
back after graduation.

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I'm going to do
more studying here.

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I'm going to go to school
hopefully for public health

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or something related with
environmental health science,

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because that's a field that's
needed in Paraguay right now.

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And [INAUDIBLE]
those two fields.

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And public health
is just growing,

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and there's nothing
really specific about it,

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that's why [INAUDIBLE].

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So we'll see what happens.

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But I did accomplish my goal.

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And last but not
least, I just want

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to thank all these
organizations that

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helped me pursue this
internship that's

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very important for me and
for my future career goals.

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Thank you.

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[APPLAUSE]

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