Mérida, Yucatán — About 500 families participated in the fourth annual Walk for International Down Syndrome Day.
Inclusion of all people with disabilities is the goal of the Center for Intervention and Inclusion of People with Down Syndrome and their Families A.C. — or CediDown — commented its director, Yoshimar Gamboa López.
Participants walked up the Paseo de Montejo and convened at the Monumento a la Patria to demonstrate their solidarity, releasing their yellow and blue balloons to the sky.
World Down Syndrome Day, observed every March 21, is a global awareness campaign which has been officially observed by the United Nations since 2012.
Down Syndrome International (DSi) encourages allies all over the world to choose their own activities and events on WDSD to help raise awareness of what Down syndrome is, what it means to have Down syndrome, and how people with Down syndrome play a vital role in our lives and communities.
Down syndrome is a congenital disorder reflecting a chromosome defect that causes intellectual impairment and physical abnormalities including short stature and a broad facial profile.
A group of volunteers called Ginkgos has joined forces with Josefina Larraín Lagos, president of the Board of CediDown, to raise funds to benefit of children with this condition. Larraín Lagos is also known as half of the Reyes Rios-Larraín design and architecture team in Mérida.
Ginkgos is a group of 23 people between the ages of 19 and 70 with a goal of positive change in Yucatecan society.
