Months after Chile’s quake, the relief effort toils on
Stephanie Mitchell
Staff Photographer
8 min read
A massive earthquake rumbled through Chile last Feb. 27, killing more than 500 people, destroying tens of thousands of homes, and unleashing a tsunami that further devastated the southern coast. Karen Anderson, a graduate of the Harvard School for Public Health, responded to the 8.8 magnitude quake through her aid organization EPES (Educación Popular en Salud), the community public health agency she founded in 1982. Months later, EPES is still assisting the damaged communities. The full story can be found on the Harvard School of Public Health’s site.
This yellow stucco facade houses the community public health organization Educación Popular en Salud (EPES), which was founded in Santiago, Chile, in 1982 by Karen Anderson, a 1999 graduate of the Harvard School of Public Health. EPES was one of the first organizations to respond to the deadly 8.8 magnitude earthquake that hit Chile on Feb. 27. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Started under Augusto Pinochet’s oppressive regime as part of the broad social movement to restore Chilean democracy, EPES is still committed to collective leadership. Here, Anderson shares a photograph of the early days: the EPES leadership team (Rosario Castillo, Anderson, and Maria Eugenia Calvin) at a summer retreat for community health promoters and their families. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Today, Calvin (from left), Anderson, and Castillo continue as part of the EPES leadership team. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer At EPES headquarters, staffers meet and discuss the country’s most pressing health care issues such as domestic violence, HIV protection and awareness, tobacco control, early breast cancer detection, and environmental health. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Lunch at the EPES center is a communal gathering and a time to share stories. Calvin (from left), her daughter Isidora Martinez, and Maria Teresa Fuentealba exchange news from the day over a hearty meal accompanied by Chilean breads and wine. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Martinez (right) and a collection of women from the community paint a mural for the EPES-led anti-violence campaign “For Me, For You, No + Violence” in the El Bosque neighborhood. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer The Andes hang in the background of an anti-violence banner suspended between street posts. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer A colorful EPES mural against domestic violence is painted outside a public primary health clinic called Santa Laura in Santiago. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer A woman passes through the rain in Concepción, where EPES has continued its community health work after the earthquake and tsunami. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Lautaro Lopez, a physician and director of the EPES center in Concepción, is pictured at the University of Concepción School of Medicine, where he graduated. Lopez, who has been with EPES for more than 20 years, led the recovery response to the earthquake and tsunami in Concepción. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer At EPES headquarters in Concepción, the staff, including Maritza Provoste (from left) and Virginia Norambuena, regularly lunches together under this spectacular mural depicting the paths to women’s empowerment. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer The Bio Bio riverfront in Concepción, a region hit hard by the earthquake, looks foggy and desolate. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer During the earthquake, some new buildings suffered substantial damage. One of the best known cases is that of Alto Rio, the 15-floor apartment building in Concepción that fell onto its back, killing eight people (79 other residents had to be rescued). Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Campamento Villa Bosquemar, a housing settlement in Penco, demonstrates the conditions in which families have lived under since the earthquake and tsunami. Lopez (left) speaks with Nuvia Villegas, one of the residents of the campamento. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer With cold winter temperatures and damp conditions, families struggle to keep warm inside their temporary houses. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Two-year-old Brittany Garrido Chacamo and her mother, Paulima Chacamo Guatardo, who is five months pregnant, are pictured in their house in Campamento Santa Clara. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Lopez (center) makes rounds in Villa Bosquemar. Zunilda Barrales (right) lives with her 105-year-old grandmother, Maria Luisa Calfuqueo (left), and possesses unmatched strength in the face of the disaster that swept her family off the coastal strip and into an emergency camp. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Anderson (from left) and Lopez listen to Barrales share stories and concerns regarding the health of her family and the cold winter conditions faced by the community in Villa Bosquemar. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Eleven-month-old Darlene Anis Villegas (from left), Natalia Shendiz, and Luis Archivalas Villegas sit inside their temporary Villa Bosquemar home. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Sandra Rita Mora (right), of Villa Bosquemar, hugs Anderson, who, along with EPES, has helped winterize many temporary homes with material support. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer The Villa Bosquemar resettlement camp in Penco is home to 50 families that once lived along the shore and depended on the sea. These independent people, low on schooling and income, are now living in one-room government-issued wooden shelters that lack running water, sharing communal latrines, and using cold-water showers. Constanza Ramirez Villegas (from left), Lopez, Provoste, Nuvia Villegas (Constanza’s mother), and Anderson speak in the campamento. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Lopez (from left) and Anderson speak inside the Villa Bosquemar Community Center. The EPES donated the furnishing, insulation, and painting of the center. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Most families in Penco (seen here) draw their sustenance from the sea. Even before the catastrophe, one in five residents were living in poverty, by government estimate. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Lopez wades through an area in Santa Clara affected by the tsunami. “This catastrophe overturned many of our assumptions and also brought us, as EPES, back to our roots,” observed Lopez. “In southern Chile, we carry earthquakes in our blood. So it wasn’t the buckling of the earth, the power of the sea, that most surprised us. It was the absence of the state, the void, and the chaos.” Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer A rainbow appears above the winterized homes in Villa Bosquemar. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Lopez and Anderson visit with Pamela Del Carmen Monsalve (right) in the emergency Campamento Ebenezer, in the Fundo Coihueco in Penco. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Juan Correa (center), president of Campamento Ebenezer, explains how the roofs of the wooden emergency homes are a new version of the traditional fanolas made with cardboard sheets soaked in tar to make them water-resistant. Unfortunately, water seeps through the roofs and the wind has also carried them away. Correa explains how not only are neighbors having their few belongings ruined or destroyed because of the rain, but many have contracted severe respiratory illnesses. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Lopez visits families in the campamento and lifts their spirits with his support and special sense of humor and care. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer A stray dog roams in Campamento Ebenezer. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Victor Novoa from Campamento Villa Bosquemar listens to the stories of residents from Campamento Ebenezer. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Night falls on Campamento Ebenezer. In the campamento, 43 families that lost their homes are now working with EPES on a plan to replace the leaking roofs of their emergency homes, furnish the small community center with tables and chairs, and start a series of health education workshops. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Lopez (pictured) walks along the beach at Penco where the tsunami destroyed this coastal village following the earthquake. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer A view of Tomé in Concepción, an area greatly affected by the earthquake. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Eighty-two-year-old fisherman Facundo Andrade told of losing his sister who was visiting from the north of Chile. He is one of the few people who are still living by the sea in Dichato. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer A woman walking along the shoreline in Dichato speaks of the devastating effects of the earthquake and tsunami. Dichato is a town along the coast of Chile, part of the municipality of Tomé in a northern part of Greater Concepción. At the 2002 census it had 3,057 residents. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Dichato’s beach had long been one of the region’s favorite spots for sunbathing and water sports. Eighty percent of the village was destroyed by the earthquake and tsunami. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer Sandra Castaneda (from left) and Maritza Provoste from EPES Concepción Center travel throughout the region to reach communities through workshops such as Comfort for Kids. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer More than 1,000 youths in five cities are participating in EPES-led workshops based on the Mercy Corps Comfort for Kids model. In this workshop, children write and draw their feelings in a “My Earthquake/Tsunami Story” notebook. Health educator Sandra Castaneda (right) from the EPES center in Concepción conducts the session. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer For the final session of the three-month program, this group celebrated with snacks and then each child received a diploma and a backpack with pencils, eraser, a stuffed animal, toothbrush, toothpaste, and a flashlight. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer A sculpture titled “The Spirit That Dances Between Us” resides at the EPES Concepción Center and represents the philosophy held by EPES in their historic work of building from the ground up, fostering and regenerating spaces for participation and collective action. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer
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