Luis Fernando Reyes

A group of relatives of children with cancer protest outside Mexico's Secretary of Public Health's Office during the coronavirus pandemic in May 2020.

MEXICO CITY — Dozens of parents of children with cancer protested outside Mexico's Secretary of Public Health on Wednesday, threatening to start a hunger strike. They say treatments have been stopped, fearing the coronavirus pandemic will make things worse.

Mexico’s public health budget and services decreased or changed as a result of the president’s frugal policies, affecting cancer patients. Now, activists claim that the government focuses on the coronavirus, leaving this high-risk group unprotected. 

Their cause has attracted the attention of the LeBarón family, whose relatives were murdered in an attack by gunmen on a road in Sonora, Mexico, last year.

"Why are the efforts to fight COVID-19 not being replicated to protect cancer victims?" asks Bryan LeBarón. 

And he says maybe the coronavirus attracts more attention because, unlike cancer, it can be spread to others.