From the Reproductive Health MIG - Care in the Face of COVID-19
I left for a global health trip to Costa Rica on March 7. We had discussed cancelling the trip, but were told as long as we wore masks and practiced hand hygiene at the airports we could still go. At that time, Costa Rica was a safe country for travel. That all changed while we were there; the in-country organization decided to send us home early without finishing all of our clinics. Since we arrived, the cases in Costa Rica climbed from one to 26. For the first time in my ten years of doing these trips, we were evacuated early. The CDC guidelines at that time did not say we needed to be quarantined, but our institution wanted to be safe and placed us on self-quarantine when we returned. Sadly, that meant our students would miss Match Day! A few days later, Match Day and all large gatherings were cancelled for all medical students everywhere as the pandemic worsened.
