TIJUANA, Mexico _ The front-line workers in Tijuana's struggling public hospitals. The ranks of Tijuana law enforcement. The Cruz Roja paramedics transporting critical coronavirus patients by ambulance.
The people who most need masks and other personal protection equipment in Baja California to confront the coronavirus pandemic are likely getting to know Tijuana-San Diego native Jose Luis Ascolani.
Through his global emergency mask initiative, the nonprofit he founded last month named GEMINI, he's been able to raise more than $3,000 to donate hundreds of gloves, goggles, face shields and N95 masks to Tijuana front-line health care workers and first responders.
"They're scared," said Ascolani, 24. "They're some of the bravest people I've ever met. If they're doing this every day, knowing they could die, the least we could do is help them."
Ascolani, a graduate from San Francisco State University, previously worked at General Atomics Aeronautical Systems and in commercial real estate before the coronavirus pandemic, when he started delivering masks and other equipment full-time. He's been locating the protective equipment wherever he can, sometimes driving up to two hours away to buy the supplies and then eight to 10 hours a day to deliver them across Tijuana.
Individuals and businesses, such as Indigo Dragon in Encinitas, are helping fund the project through his Go Fund Me page where he's documenting his daily activity.
In Baja California, the border city of Tijuana, with 3.3 million residents, has 1,037 of the state's 1,962 confirmed coronavirus cases, and 203 of the 298 deaths as of Wednesday.
In Mexico, the only place with a higher number of deaths is Mexico City, also characterized as its own state with a population of 21.3 million people and 543 deaths.
However, health care experts believe the number of actual coronavirus cases across Mexico and in Tijuana is significantly larger because of severely limited testing.
"Individual medical workers aren't getting the support they need from their government," said Ascolani, who was born in San Diego, but grew up in Tijuana, playing soccer there. "Doctors are paying out-of-pocket, some as much as 18,000 pesos _ the equivalent of $741 in the U.S. (for personal protection equipment.) Others are waiting nine hours in line to purchase N95 masks from local suppliers."
One of those suppliers is in East Tijuana. Nurses standing outside a supply company waiting to purchase their own face shields, goggles and coveralls told the The San Diego Union-Tribune they live in fear of infecting their own families with the virus. It's nearly impossible to find N95 masks to buy, and several said they spend most of their time in between shifts searching for them.
Ascolani said sometimes nurses and medics start crying when he delivers the protective equipment because they're overwhelmed by the kind gesture.
One nurse working in Clinic 1, a public hospital battling the pandemic, said most health care workers are depending on private donations to have enough masks and gloves to get through their shifts. Otherwise they have to reuse them.
She said many people have shown anger rather than appreciation at nurses in public, asking them to leave grocery stores or refusing them service at gas stations.
"We have to change out of our uniform before we go home or we could face harassment in the streets," said the nurse, who asked not to be named because she is not authorized to speak with media.
The lack of protective equipment in Tijuana and across Mexico has not only pushed health care providers nearly to their breaking point, it's also been the driving factor in several outbreaks. At least 24 hospital staff at Tijuana's Clinica 20 fell ill from the virus, several critically.
The governor of Baja California, Jaime Bonilla, criticized federal authorities for the lack of protective gear in his border state, saying doctors were "dropping like flies."
Unlike in the United States, the majority of Mexico's population receives health care from the federal government. The Social Security Institute, known by its Spanish acronym IMSS, is the country's largest public health network within the federal health care system. It serves more than half of Mexico's population in 350 public hospitals and thousands of clinics across the nation.
IMSS has struggled in recent years with funding because of an aging population and ballooning pension costs, as well as budget cuts. The coronavirus pandemic has only made those fragments in the already struggling health care system more visible.
Outside Clinica 1 _ officially named IMSS Hospital General Regional No. 1 _ anesthesiologist Jose Baltazar met Ascolani last week to pick up 30 face shields, 50 masks and 20 goggles.
"The need we have right now is principally for the N95 masks. We have many people who are working without them or they're re-using their own masks," said Baltazar, who noted the reuse of the masks makes both health care workers, as well as their patients, more vulnerable.
Slightly emotional about the donation, Baltazar explained many in his industry are feeling exposed and unappreciated.
"We are very happy and very grateful to people like Jose who reach out to help us and make us understand there are still people out there who care with good hearts," he said.
Like many, Ascolani enjoys a life that spans both sides of the border with parents from Tijuana, school in San Diego, and sports south of the border while growing up. When he saw the Union-Tribune's April 10 report about conditions inside Tijuana public hospitals, he started delivering masks and protective equipment to nurses, doctors, police officers and paramedics nearly every day.
He is part of a growing movement of Tijuana and San Diego residents stepping forward to raise funds and gather donations for the beleaguered medical staffs.
The key to cross-border efforts is coordinating among the different donors and hospitals, said Anne McEnany, president and CEO of the National City-based International Community Foundation.
"We want to make sure that philanthropy is filling gaps that government is not covering, as opposed to trying to do everything," McEnany said recently.
A coalition of people, charities and private companies recently donated 92 hospital beds to a temporary hospital located inside Tijuana's Zonkey's basketball stadium. The owners of the stadium donated the space.
"COVID-19 is a binational issue between sister cities," said Ascolani, who said resolving it would require cooperation on both sides.
He said it will be essential for leaders to work on both sides the border to overcome the pandemic _ something of which he said he hasn't seen enough.
"People in San Diego need to worry about Tijuana," he said. "There's no way San Diego comes out of this without Tijuana coming out of it."
