99th INSP/ESPM Mexico graduation ceremony

The National Institute of Public Health (INSP) held its 99th graduation ceremony on Friday, Sept. 3, for the School of Public Health of Mexico (ESPM). Like the previous commencement in 2020, the ceremony was held virtually for the 195 graduates due to the global health emergency that is COVID-19.

A welcome video initiated the ceremony in which a faculty representative congratulated both students and faculty for their achievements and for the virtual work conducted in the 2020-2021 academic year. Pablo Uriel Morales Durán, president of the Association of Students of the School of Public Health of Mexico (AEESPM), who received his master’s in science in Health Systems and Policy and Kathia Larissa Quevedo, who earned her MS in Nutrition, were masters of ceremony.

After the introduction, Dr. Eduardo Lazcano Ponce, ESPM Academic Dean lauded faculty and students for their achievements. He said obtaining a degree “is the result of collaborative laborious efforts” that make the recent grads “champions of public health.” Dr. Lazcano underscored the strategies implemented at ESPM to maintain this last academic year on-line, while complying with the quality standards of a school with almost 100 years of history.  “During the last 18 months the students took on a distance education strategy without being able to attend our academic campuses and, indisputably obtain the corresponding credits, and finish their thesis work or final projects.”

“Online classes allowed us to protect the student community, our academic body and INSP members as well as their families. Students had to cease seeing their friends. In fact, freshmen have not even been able to personally meet their peers. We, as a faculty, had to venture into an — until recently — alien modality. But with enormous commitment we created innovative and functional pedagogical methods. We prepared ourselves, but we also unlearned and learned, to be able to face situations in an epidemiological emergency environment that each of us lived in a different way,” said Dr. Lazcano. “We are proud to witness your joy and that of your families’. We serve as examples of resilience and adaptation capabilities,” he concluded.

Then it was INSP General Director Dr. Juan Rivera Dommarco’s turn to address the graduates. He mentioned being “very proud of the INSP/ESPM because, despite all the obstacles and difficulties derived from the COVID-19 pandemic, everyone — students, teachers, families, and the INSP community — have done our duty. I am pleased that today 195 students from 24 academic programs, from 23 states of the Mexican Republic, nine countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, Europe and the United States, will receive their degree and that nearly 60 percent of our graduates are women .”

From an empty Guillermo Soberón Auditorium in the main headquarters of INSP Cuernavaca, from where the live broadcast took place, he offered advice that, from his perspective, he said can lead to innovation and leadership opportunities for the professional life of the recent graduates.

“First, we need to strengthen our health systems. Second, look after of non-COVID diseases and preventive programs. Third, have strategies to prevent and control chronic non-communicable diseases (cancer and mental illnesses). Fourth, COVID is here to stay; the scenarios can be very diverse (and) we must be attentive to all of them. The new normality will be unlike anything we knew prior to the pandemic. We must continue to address the effects of it. Fifth, inequity; the gaps of inequality grew significantly because of the pandemic. It is possible to observe setbacks in what we believed had already been overcome or controlled. We must be vigilant in the control and prevention of these diseases. Commitment to equity defines us as public health professionals.

“Sixth, degradation of natural systems and transgression of planetary limits. During 2020 and 2021 it became very evident that humans are degrading natural systems in unprecedented magnitude. Already we have exceeded the limits of several systems: global warming, loss of biodiversity, land conversion and nitrogen and phosphorus loading that causes eutrophication. We are already overrun and we are days away from passing several more processes. Humanity is at a crossroads. It is a crucial moment in homo-sapiens’ history. We need urgent, radical and transformative actions to protect present generations and especially future generations. We must redefine prosperity: better health, better quality of life for all, with equity and with respect for the integrity of our planet. We must create new sustainable consumption patterns. We need to stop being consumerists. If we want to reverse the transgression of natural systems, health workers must be agents of change and transformation at the individual and institutional level. We require your commitment to confront the challenges that humans face”.

His final message to graduates: “Achieve a consistent life with the values that public health entails, that your work always be aimed at contributing to make the right to health a reality for the entire population. That must be our compass. Assume the values of respect, fairness, tolerance and above all fidelity to scientific evidence and its application. Congratulations. ESPM/ INSP is your home and always will be.”

Mexico City’s Health Minister Dr. Oliva López Arellano – who received her ScD in Public Health at ESPM/INSP, was class sponsor for the 99^th Class of her alma mater. She thanked them for that distinction and reminded the graduates of the commitment that public health workers have to carry out their activities in an ethical and socially responsible manner, “knowing that public health as a specialized field of knowledge and practice is essential for life and diversity. The quantity of professionals trained at the ESPM since its foundation and throughout these 99 years, she said, is proof that it has remained a priority to respond to the principal health problems of the population and that of other countries”.

In her final message, Dr. López Arellano highlighted the year’s activities that ESPM has carried out because “they are examples of a community that responds to present challenges and also has the capacity to anticipate problems in the future that may become critical. I congratulate you all. May you all be successful above all in public ethics and in your commitment to guaranteeing the right to health”.

Following Dr. López’s remarks, the INSP/ESPM paid posthumous tribute to the professors and students who passed away in the last year: Dr. José Luis Torres Estrada and Dr. Americo D. Rodríguez Ramírez of the Regional Center for Public Health Research in Tapachula, Chiapas -another INSP campus-; Dr. Sandra Gabriel Sosa Rubí from the Population Health Research Center; and to PhD student, Eduardo López Hernández. Similarly, the ceremony provided the opportunity to the doctorate and master programs representatives to applaud the gran work of their colleagues, especially during the last 18 months of their respective programs.

INSP-ESPM congratulates its 195 graduates.