International
The mother who decided to walk 1,300 kilometers in Chile to get an expensive medicine and save her son from a serious illness
Walking the more than 1,300 kilometers that separate the commune of Ancud in Chiloé from the Palacio de la Moneda in Santiago in Chile may seem like a chimera to many.
Not so for the Chilean Camila Gómez, a mother who completes this challenge with the goal of raising 3.5 billion pesos (US$3.7 million) to buy a vital medicine for her five-year-old son and make visible the cause of patients with rare diseases in Chile.
Time is pressing. His son, Tomás Ross, suffers from Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a severe ailment that worsens quickly. If you do not receive the drug as soon as possible, it will be difficult to stop the disease.
“It is a very expensive medicine and a disease that in Chile has no opportunities, but there are opportunities abroad,” Gómez tells BBC Mundo.
Thousands of Chileans turned to Gómez’s case, whose determination went viral in the country.
The mother left Ancud on April 28 with Marcos Reyes, president of the Duchenne Families corporation in Chile, who also has two teenage children with the disease.
It was precisely Reyes who suggested the idea of the walk to Gómez.
“We walk for all the children and families who suffer from the disease. Time is running out,” Gómez said in an interview with the 24-hour national news.
The goal, in addition to raising funds and making their causes visible, is to get Chilean President Gabriel Boric to “bring a bill to Congress” that allows to improve the coverage of rare diseases in the country, as Reyes explains to BBC Mundo.
“He was born healthy, without any problem or complication, until at the age of four we realized that he had difficulty climbing stairs and performing some types of physical activity,” Gómez said on social networks.
“Until that moment there was no cure, but for a few months we have had a hope; in the United States the first drug was approved whose objective is to stop the progression of the disease,” Gómez continued.
This drug is marketed as elevidys and is administered intravenously in patients who, like Ross, are between four and five years old.
There are several types of muscular dystrophy, although Duchenne is the most common form and also one of the most severe.
The disease is unleashed due to a defective gene that results in the absence of dystrophin, a protein that helps keep the body’s cells intact.
Patients can develop problems when walking and running, fatigue, learning difficulties and cardiac and respiratory deficiencies due to the weakening of vital muscles in these functions.
The British national health services indicate that it normally affects young children and that people with this ailment usually live until they are 20 or 30 years old.
Gómez talks to BBC Mundo this Sunday, May 12, in “a little pause, while eating a little.”
It has already been more than two weeks of a journey that has about half left.
At the time of speaking, he is at the Púa toll booth, in the Araucanía Region, still more than 600 kilometers from the capital.
“This journey is crazy, but we think it’s turning out more than imagined,” says Gómez.
The first week was hard, but the mother says that with the passing of the days everything is getting easier.
“It’s impressive how the body adapts to the rhythm and it’s not so terrible anymore,” he says.
He is also helped by the emotional impulse he received by surprise last Friday, May 10 on the occasion of Mother’s Day.
Her son Tomás found her in the city of Temuco, accompanied by her father Alex Ross, to give her a hug, a bouquet of flowers and a recharge of encouragement.
“The boy knows that his mother gathers talks to find him a remedy, but he was only there for a while and turned to Chiloé. Because of the disease he has, he shouldn’t be cold,” Alex Ross tells BBC Mundo.
By May 10, the family had managed to raise more than half of the funds.
Gómez documents his tour on his social media accounts, where he receives thousands of messages of support, hundreds of thousands of views in his videos, the attention of the press and the company of other walkers who join in some sections of his tour.
“This has grown so much that I must help with the whole logistical issue: I look for accommodation, food, I assist them on the route with dry clothes, I look for podiatrists, kinesiologists and medicines,” says Alex Ross.
Camila Gómez and Marcos Reyes expect to arrive in La Moneda at the end of May, depending on the weather conditions.
A long way to make its causes visible that goes beyond the more than 1,300 kilometers that they will have traveled at the end of their journey.
International
Trump to build $200M ballroom at the White House by 2028
The U.S. government under President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that it will begin construction in September on a new 8,000-square-meter ballroom at the White House.
The announcement was made by Karoline Leavitt, the administration’s press secretary, during a briefing in which she explained that the expansion responds to the need for a larger venue to host “major events.”
“Other presidents have long wished for a space capable of accommodating large gatherings within the White House complex… President Trump has committed to solving this issue,” Leavitt told reporters.
The project is estimated to cost $200 million, fully funded through donations from Trump himself and other “patriots,” according to a government statement. Construction is scheduled to begin in September and is expected to be completed before Trump’s term ends in 2028.
The Clark Construction Group, a Virginia-based company known for projects such as the Capital One Arena and L’Enfant Plaza in Washington, D.C., has been selected to lead the project.
The new ballroom will be built on the East Wing of the White House, expanding the iconic residence with a space designed for state dinners, official ceremonies, and large-scale events.
International
Three salvadorans in Florida sentenced in $146 million construction tax fraud scheme
Three Salvadoran residents living in Orlando, Florida, were sentenced for conspiracy to commit tax fraud and wire fraud involving a scheme exceeding $146 million in the construction industry, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida. The sentence was handed down by federal judge Timothy J. Corrigan on Tuesday, July 29.
Eduardo Aníbal Escobar (45) was sentenced to 4 years and 9 months in prison, Carlos Alberto Rodríguez (36) to 3 years and 4 months, and Adelmy Tejada (57) to 18 months in prison, followed by 6 months of house arrest. All three pled guilty on April 3, 2025.
In addition to the prison terms, the court ordered restitution payments totaling $36,957,616 to the IRS for unpaid payroll taxes, and $397,895 to two insurers for workers’ compensation claims related to the scheme.
Escobar and Rodríguez are permanent legal residents originally from El Salvador, while Tejada is a naturalized U.S. citizen of Salvadoran origin.
International
Kremlin hails preparedness after Kamchatka quakes leave no casualties
The Kremlin expressed relief that the earthquakes that struck Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula today —the first being the strongest since 1952— resulted in no casualties, and emphasized that the region is well prepared to face such natural disasters.
“Thank God, there were no victims,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov during his daily press briefing.
The presidential representative stated that “all alert systems were activated in time, and evacuations were organized for residents in areas requiring it in response to tsunami threats.”
“Overall, the seismic resilience of the buildings proved effective (…) Therefore, we can say that the technological preparedness demonstrated a high level,” Peskov added.
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