Havana/Since the early hours of Saturday, when the capture of Nicolás Maduro by US troops was confirmed, a question began to be repeated insistently in Cuba: what will happen to the thousands of doctors and health professionals who remain on official mission in Venezuela? More than three days after the event, the answer is still not clear, while uncertainty grows among aid workers and their families.
In Caracas, the activity of the Cuban medical brigades is practically paralyzed. “Everything is stopped here. We are not working or treating patients. We are waiting for a decision from Havana,” he explains to 14ymedio a doctor who is on a mission in the Venezuelan capital and prefers to remain anonymous. According to his testimony, the version is strongly circulating among the aid workers that the repatriation of those who have already completed the regulatory mission time will begin before the 16th. “But I have a friend in a state near the border with Colombia who was told that they are waiting for the order to return to work. There is a lot of confusion,” she adds.
Other testimonies point to a progressive evacuation. A source close to Public Health officials deployed in Caracas assures that the instruction is to “remove all personnel as soon as possible.” The plan, according to this version, would begin with those who have been on mission the longest and had not been able to return due to lack of flights. “The rest of us will leave later, because the idea is to evacuate this as soon as possible,” says the doctor, who emphasizes that the pace will depend on air availability. “Right now Cubana practically has no planes, and that is delaying everything.”
The situation is especially tense for those who had already finished their mission and remained in Venezuela waiting for transportation.
The situation is especially tense for those who had already finished their mission and remained in Venezuela awaiting transportation. “We are quartered, we cannot move from the points where we are because they have told us that at any moment we have to leave,” says a young doctor who concluded her contract last August and has not been able to return to the Island. “We are not working, just waiting for them to tell us the day and time to leave.” The doctor recognizes that fear is generalized. “Everything is very confusing, nobody knows what is going to happen.”
This nervousness contrasts with the message transmitted by the Ministry of Public Health, which this Saturday assured on social networks that Cuban collaborators in Venezuela are “protected” after the US intervention. The head of the sector, José Ángel Portal, limited himself to stating that the professionals are safe, without offering details about evacuation plans, relocation or continuity of missions.
Beyond the official reassuring tone, the testimonies collected by this newspaper paint a different picture. A doctor stationed in Caracas said that, although her coordinators insist that “everything is fine” and that we must wait for instructions from Havana, the tension is evident. “The bosses are very nervous. Right now we are all paying attention to what Trump says,” he explained in a telephone conversation. “I’m about to finish the mission and I have bought my children’s clothes. Imagine if they move us and I can’t take anything with me.”
In other regions of the country the situation seems less defined. From the state of Zulia, a Cuban collaborator commented that “yesterday they told us one thing and today they tell us another”, although he recognizes that there are sectors of the Venezuelan population who on Saturday celebrated the fall of Chavismo. “Yes or no, I have everything ready to go.”
The concern has also spread to Cuba. “My son called me saying that they had taken Maduro and at that time I started calling my daughter like crazy because I have her there,” explains a retiree living in Alamar. “I came to be able to talk to her about three hours later because communications were congested and she told me that they were grouping them together in a location.”
After learning of the death of 32 Cubans during the operation to capture Maduro, the doctors’ relatives have multiplied their comments of concern
After learning of the death of 32 Cubans during the operation to capture Maduro, the doctors’ relatives have multiplied their comments of concern. “They are not soldiers, they deserve to be with their families,” wrote one Internet user on the Ministry of Health’s Facebook page. Others questioned the lack of transparency: “Now they have the relatives going crazy here and they don’t give us information.”
An eventual interruption of medical programs in Venezuela would have a direct impact on the already fragile Cuban economy. Health missions have been the main source of foreign exchange for the State for more than two decades, through bilateral agreements that bring in billions of dollars annually. In a context of uncontrolled inflation, food shortages and prolonged blackouts, the loss of this flow would aggravate the internal crisis.
The presence of Cuban health personnel in Venezuela, which began in the early 2000s, has been key both in the political relationship between both governments and in the financial support of the Island. However, independent organizations have been denouncing the working conditions of these missions for years: withholding of salaries, political surveillance, restrictions on mobility and forced separation of families.
In a scenario marked by military intervention and regional uncertainty, these complaints take on an even more critical dimension. While Havana remains silent about specific plans, thousands of Cuban doctors and nurses remain confined, waiting for a call to tell them whether they will return home or if they will have to put on their gowns again in a country whose immediate future remains unpredictable.
