By Natasha Korecki
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Monday, November 17, 2003

Most people wouldn't peg the town nurse as the person who tracks population.

But every month in Quiringuicharo's health clinic, Rosa Maria Albados pulls out a graph-styled tablet and logs the exact number of residents.

She does it, she says, for the sake of public health.

In a town where so many people travel back and forth, children are sometimes forgotten, she said.

Families sometimes travel to the United States without vaccinating their children, exposing them to new illnesses. Or women might return to Quiringuicharo for the winter with young children who have not received their shots.

So Albados sometimes resorts to walking through town and knocking on doors to make sure she's spread the word to everyone.

With so many of the residents living in the United States, the population fluctuates greatly month to month - sometimes by the hundreds.

It's a constant battle to fight the spread of disease, she said. Prevention becomes especially important when the nearest hospital is about an hour away.

The other major health problem that arises in this Mexican pueblo is aggravated by flies.

When temperatures soar, most residents keep their homes wide open allowing in flies, mosquitoes and the contamination they spread.

Albados tries to educate many of the lower-income residents of the importance of using screens on open windows and doors.

"They could buy them but they don't," Albados said. "They don't see how important it is, they look at it and say: 'ahh.' "