Enriqueta Medellín

Enriqueta Medellín (10 December 1948 – 6 January 2022) was a Mexican surgeon and environmentalist. Raised in Mexico City, from a young age she participated in projects to clean up the city and became interested in the links between disease and the environment. She earned a degree as a medical surgeon from the National Autonomous University of Mexico and specialized in human genetics. She also studied environmental education and management.

After participating in humanitarian aid projects following the 1985 Mexico City earthquake, she and her extended family relocated to Aguascalientes City in 1987, where she worked as a surgeon while becoming known for environmental activism. Along with her mother and other activists, she founded the association Conciencia Ecológica (Ecological Consciousness) in 1992. This group of activists carried out the first recycling project in the state and introduced numerous projects to raise awareness on waste, teach people about preserving the environment, and protest against developmental projects that caused harm to the environment. She was involved at the local, state, national, and international levels in the creation of policy to protect ecosystems.

Medellín was the first person to be awarded the state prize for Environmental Merit in 2006 and received Mexico's highest honor for environmentalists, the Premio al Mérito Ecológico (Ecological Merit Award) in 2012. In 2020, she received the Biotopo de Oro (Golden Biotope) from the National College of Ecological Doctors and the following year was granted the Aguascaliente Prize in the Clear Water category. The state's ecological and tree replenishment facility was renamed as the Queta Medellín Ecological Center in 2021. At the time of her death in 2022, Medellín was one of the most prominent environmental activists in the central region of Mexico. Posthumously, the municipality of Aguascalientes created the Enriqueta Medellín Prize in her honor to mark contributions by individuals and organizations who have made exemplary efforts to better the community and environment.