Survival funds for the Santiago Cortez family in Guatemala

Covid-19 is out of control in Guatemala right now, and our family has been hit hard. We come from a large family - 10 siblings, their spouses and children. Nearly everybody has been infected with Covid over the past month, and unfortunately we have lost 3 of our loved ones. David was the oldest of the siblings, a great supporter and advocate for the community. Geovanni, husband of Dreisy and father of 5 wonderful girls. Yohana, wife of Marcos and mother of 3, the kindest gentlest person you could ever meet.

We are a very tight knit family, sharing our lives daily.

Losing a family member is so hard, but we have also lost three breadwinners, in a time when jobs are scarce and money is tight.

We have created this page with the intention of raising funds to help pay for the ongoing medical needs of our family members who are recovering from Covid, as well as to provide food and other basic needs. Currently we are attempting to support 30 people on the income of 4, it's just not enough.

To have a family member on oxygen at home costs nzd$600 per day, plus the varying costs of medications, doctors visits and diagnostic tests. In Guatemala you can provide basic foodstuffs for 4 people for nzd$70 per week. So it's hard to put an exact figure on how much we need to raise but for now we are mainly concerned with putting food on the table as well as medical cost.

Being so far away from our family during these tragedies is truly heartbreaking and on top of that exhausting our personal funds has been pretty scary too. So we are asking for donations, no matter how big or small to help us support our family abroad while they recover and grieve amongst the chaos in Guatemala.