Noticiero Movil

image with altar for the day of the dead with photo of Frida KahloAltar for the Day of the Dead taken at the Blue House in Coyoacán, Mexico where Frida Kahlo lived. Photo by Claudia Cruz/Illustration by Laura Rivas.

Commemorating those we have lost in 2020 on the Day of the Dead

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This year is definitely one for the history books. Ever since the declaration of the COVID-19 pandemic, our lives have been completely turned upside down.

Many of us have stopped working with no idea when we will find employment again. Our children are frustrated with their schoolwork and we fear they will fall behind in their studies. Of course, none of this would have happened if not for this new coronavirus that has forced many of us into an existence full of anxiety, loneliness and melancholy.

Sadly, deaths from COVID-19 have been and continue to be higher in the Latino community. According to a report by the McKinsey consulting firm, Latinos in the United States are more likely to “develop COVID-19, to lack access to testing, to suffer from severe cases of the disease, and to die from it.”

“He died from COVID-19. “He has died from the coronavirus. “We lost him because of COVID”. How many times have we heard these words this unforgettable year? This means that many families in our communities feel great pain for the loss of their loved ones.

James Albert Wilson (1927-2020)

Dear family members like the Dr. James Albert Wilson, who died from COVID-19 on April 5 at the age of 93. He immigrated to the United States in the 1960s and was the first Dominican to opened a medical practice first in Washington Heights, a Manhattan neighborhood in New York City, and then another in Bronx County. Dr. Wilson practiced as an internist and family doctor for some 40 years providing services to immigrant families in Spanish. He was born in the province of Barahona, Dominican Republic. He is survived by his wife, six children, eight grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Noticiero Móvil, and our media partners, want to honor other Latinos in Reno, Sparks, Washoe County, the state of Nevada and across the country who are no longer with us.

We invite you to share with our editorial staff photos and a few words about your loved one who died this 2020 — of COVID-19 or not. Our hope is to include brief profiles of your deceased family or friend to a collective Días de los Muertos altar, so that we can join in your grief and hopefully help you honor them.

If you wish to send a photo with text, you can do so from now until November 1st to noticiero.movil15@gmail.com. Please include the name and surname of your loved one as well as their age at the time of death and the place where they lived.

Editor’s note: This note was updated at 5:38 p.m. to correct that Dr. Wilson was an internist and not a pediatrician.