Lucrecia Hernández Mack

Lucrecia María Hernández Mack (16 November 1973 – 6 September 2023) was a Guatemalan physician and politician who served a deputy of the Congress from 2020 until her death in 2023. In July 2016, President Jimmy Morales nominated Hernández Mack as the minister of Public Health and Social Assistance, becoming the first woman to serve in that position. In 2017, she resigned from her position in protest over President Morales' order to expel United Nations anti-corruption investigator Iván Velásquez Gómez. A member of Movimiento Semilla, she served in the Congress after winning in the 2019 General Election.

In this Spanish name, the first or paternal surname is Hernández and the second or maternal family name is Mack.
Lucrecia Hernández Mack
Official portrait, 2020
Minister of Public Health and Social Assistance
In office
1 August 2016 – 27 August 2017
PresidentJimmy Morales
Preceded byJosé Alfonso Cabrera
Succeeded byCarlos Soto Menegazzo
Deputy of the Congress of Guatemala
In office
14 January 2020 – 6 September 2023
ConstituencyNational List
Personal details
Born(1973-11-16)16 November 1973
Guatemala City, Guatemala
Died6 September 2023(2023-09-06) (aged 49)
Political partySemilla
Children2
Parent
Alma materUniversidad de San Carlos de Guatemala

Biography

Hernández Mack studied medicine at the Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala. She also obtained a master's degree in Public Health at Rafael Landívar University and a doctorate from Mexico's Metropolitan Autonomous University (UAM).[1] After graduating, she worked as a consultant in several international organizations such as the Pan American Health Organization and the World Health Organization.[2]

In 2015, she was actively involved in the protests that led to the resignation of President Otto Pérez Molina.[3]

On 27 July 2016, President Jimmy Morales appointed Hernández Mack to replace Alfonso Cabrera as Minister of Public Health. Cabrera had announced his stepping down the week before, citing personal and health reasons, after being in office for only several months.[2][4] She became the first woman to head Guatemala's health ministry.[5] Soon afterwards, many problems in the ministry, including misallocation of funds, over-spending and other irregularities indicating rampant corruption, led her to file a number of complaints with both the Attorney General and the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG).[5]

She resigned on 27 August 2017 in response to the president's call for the expulsion of Iván Velásquez Gómez, the head of CICIG.[6] [7] She accused President Morales of being in favor of "impunity". Three vice-ministers, Adrián Chávez, Juan Carlos Verdugo Urrejola, and Édgar Rolando González Barreno, resigned with her.[7][8]

Hernández Mack was among the founders of the progressive political party Movimiento Semilla,[9] whose presidential candidate, Bernardo Arévalo, won the 2023 elections.[10]

In 2019 she was elected to Congress for a four-year term as a member of Movimiento Semilla; during her time as a congresswoman she sponsored several pieces of legislation in the health sector. She declined to stand for re-election in 2023 for health reasons.[1]

Personal life and death

Born on 16 November 1973,[1] Lucrecia Hernández Mack was the daughter of anthropologist Myrna Mack.[11] In 1990, Myrna Mack was assassinated by a military death squad because of her criticism of the Guatemalan government's treatment of internally displaced persons, particularly the indigenous Maya peoples.[12] Her murder later led to a case before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights,[13] through which her family received compensation from the state.

Lucrecia Hernández Mack had two sons.[14] She died of ovarian cancer on 6 September 2023, at the age of 49.[1]

Publications

See also

References
  1. Fallece diputada Lucrecia Hernández Mack (Congreso de Guatemala, 6 September 2023)
  2. Contreras, Geovanni (27 July 2016). "Lucrecia Hernández Mack, nueva ministra de Salud". Prensa Libre (in Spanish). Retrieved 26 August 2018.
  3. Ayala, Andina; Albani, Paolina (7 September 2023). "Lucrecia Hernández Mack: La brújula de la ética bien calibrada". Ruda. Retrieved 9 September 2023.
  4. "Lucrecia Hernández Mack es la nueva ministra de Salud". La Hora. 26 July 2016. Retrieved 26 August 2018.
  5. Blitzer, Jonathan (30 May 2019). "The Trump Administration's Self-Defeating Policy Toward the Guatemalan Elections". The New Yorker. ISSN 0028-792X. Retrieved 10 September 2023. In July of 2016, Lucrecia Hernández Mack, a forty-two-year-old public-health advocate, became the first woman to head Guatemala's Ministry of Health. Her background was in think tanks, not politics, and Mack was cautious about accepting the position. ...
  6. "Guatemalan president orders out UN anti-corruption investigator". BBC. 28 August 2017. Retrieved 26 August 2018.
  7. Partlow, Joshua (27 August 2017). "Guatemalan president attempts to kick out U.N. anti-corruption chief". The Washington Post. Retrieved 26 August 2018.
  8. Hernández Mayén, Manuel (27 August 2017). "Funcionarios de Jimmy Morales presentan su renuncia". Prensa Libre. Retrieved 9 September 2023.
  9. Gonzalez, Luis (7 September 2023). "Fallece Lucrecia Hernández Mack, diputada de Semilla". República. Retrieved 9 September 2023.
  10. "Bernardo Arevalo: Anti-corruption leader wins Guatemala election". BBC News. 21 August 2023. Retrieved 9 September 2023.
  11. Institute of Medicine; National Academy of Engineering; National Academy of Sciences (29 May 2003). Guatemala: Human Rights and the Myrna Mack Case. National Academies Press. p. 3. ISBN 978-0-309-18263-8.
  12. Guatemala: Human Rights and the Myrna Mack Case. 2003. doi:10.17226/10691. ISBN 978-0-309-08916-6. Retrieved 9 September 2023. {{cite book}}: |website= ignored (help)
  13. "Case of Myrna Mack Chang v. Guatemala: Judgment (Merits, Reparations and Costs)" (PDF). Inter-American Court of Human Rights. 25 November 2003. Retrieved 7 September 2023.
  14. "Lucrecia Hernández Mack: "los amores de mi vida son mis hijos y Guatemala"". Prensa Comunitaria. 21 November 2019. Retrieved 8 September 2023.
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