A border region in the United States was seeing an increase in hospitalizations that people believed was a result of citizens who lived in Mexico coming to the U.S. for medical attention.

Doctors and other health experts in Tijuana and other Mexican border cities were concerned that the coronavirus might be coming from the United States instead.

Doctors are dropping like flies

Residents from Nogales blocked the border at Arizona with their vehicles to prevent traffic from crossing. They argued that their government was not doing their job to screen people coming in from the United States, which would risk more Mexicans contracting the coronavirus.

Compared to Tijuana, San Diego had three times as many patients who tested positive for COVID-19, despite that the population of both cities were roughly the same. While Mexico had a low testing rate, the confirmed cases in California state was twenty times that of Baja California state, which was smaller in population. The disparity was disconcerting.

Baja California Governor Jaime Bonilla was livid last month when he said that the doctors in the state were "dropping like flies".  The public health system was having shortages of medical supplies and equipment.

At the same time, local authorities in California as well as healthcare institutions voiced their concern about people crossing the border to find medical attention and treatment in the U.S.

San Diego County Supervisor Kristin Gaspar asked Vice President Mike Pence in a letter last month requesting aid to help Mexico treat their patients. She was worried about the transmission in northern Mexico. And so, a temporary clinic was built at the border to treat patients coming in from Mexican ambulances, thereby eliminating the need to cross over to the United States.

Coronavirus cases in Tijuana rose late in March just as many businesses closed down in California. Dr. Remedios Lozada from the Tijuana health district said that he believed the surge of cases could be attributed to the nationals who came home after working abroad when the businesses shut down.

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Border crossing prioritized over health

Following the U.S. government's decision to extend border restrictions this month, Mexico tried implementing the same measures on nonessential traffic from the neighboring country.

Like the half-hearted testing efforts in the cities, local authorities near the borders only check pedestrians for symptoms. Commercial travel deemed essential continued to cross the border as a large mass of traffic coming to and from both directions.

Officials in Tijuana feared a resurgence in the near future, especially since the city has already finished dealing with what they thought was their peak. Compared to before, the intensive care units in the hospitals were only at 60% capacity this week. Patients with mild symptoms were sent to neighborhood clinics.

An agricultural region in California called the Imperial Valley that rested on the border with Mexico was seeing a surge in hospitalizations.

Researcher at the College of the Northern Border José María Ramos criticized the Lopez Obrador administration for allowing the U.S. government to send back immigrants at random to Mexico, which endangered public health.

She added that because this was a national emergency, health should be a priority rather than a second option to issues like migration.