Aguirre served as the Director of COVID-19 Operations at Alivio Medical Center, a federally qualified health center (FQHC), from 2020-2022. The COVID-19 department employed over 50 staff members funded through multiple multi-million dollar grants, which Aguirre personally managed. The grants gave Aguirre the opportunity to manage and oversee free public health services in Berwyn, Illinois and in Chicago's Pilsen neighborhood: two COVID-19 drive-thru testing sites, a COVID-19 contact tracing team, a homebound vaccination program, and The City of Chicago's #1 performing mobile/pop-up vaccination program. Aguirre's team administered over 100,000 vaccinations in 2021.
Aguirre's team, assigned to the city's southwest region, is famous for vaccinating over 10,000 people at the Swap-O-Rama flea market in the Back of The Yards neighborhood. Aguirre proposed this unconventional location to the City of Chicago as a site for his team to service due to the heavy foot traffic by a population with low vaccination levels: Hispanics/Latinos. The City did not initially approve the site, but Aguirre persisted in his advocacy, citing the confidence he had in his team's ability to establish trust with the target population. 10,000 vaccinations later, it is clear that Aguirre has the creativity and charisma to lead efficient, high quality, and free public healthcare services wherever the people may be.
Aguirre's ability to revolutionize public health by meeting communities where they are uniquely qualifies him to lead the effort to revolutionize the country’s porous public health infrastructure. Aguirre will fight for legislation to ensure America is prepared for the next pandemic.