Havana/The head of the Cuban Red Cross on Thursday revealed to Miguel Díaz-Canel an unlikely fact about the loyalty of the doctors who leave mission: “There is a minority that thinks of the individual and winning a little more. I do not think it is a significant percentage; most agree that this remuneration – the one paid by the host countries and from which the government appropriates – is used in Cuba.”
With a certain spite, the president finished: “He who disagrees is not obliged to go.” The State needs that “contribution”, had admitted minutes before by discussing another fact: only 26% of the income generated by medical brigades abroad is reinvested in Cuban health. And not even, because they have often had to take part of that money to pay food or fuel imports.
Díaz-Canel had summoned the leader of the Red Cross, the Cuban Minister of Health and the Secretary of State for Science and Technology of Honduras-a former student of the Latin American School of Medicine-to make an apology of the MISSIONS Doctors in your program From the Presidencyin the light of the recent statements of the administration of Donald Trump.
“There is no caste that is enriched with that money,” Díaz-Canel insisted and the phrase became immediately a slogan
“There is no caste that is enriched with that money,” Diaz-Canel insisted and the phrase became immediately a slogan among the guests. Carlos Ricardo Pérez, head of the Cuban Red Cross and a medical “several times enslaved” by the regime, the president was ironic – echoing the accusations of slave labor of several international organizations -, he claimed that everything was clear in the contract before taking the plane.
The keyword is the “informed consensus”, a formula that clarifies to the health personnel that will receive a “stipend”, whose value oscillates “depending on the country, if it is richer or poorer.” In addition, he celebrated, his salary is still paid in Cuban pesos and retains his place.
After all, Pérez argued, “nobody forces them”: “You can always sign the contract and not go abroad,” and even the official sees “a trend” in doctors to worry more about money than for “solidarity.”
According to the Minister of Public Health, José Ángel Portal Miranda, Cuba currently has more than 24,000 doctors, nurses, stomatologists and technicians operating in 56 countries. Since the MISSIONSsome 605,000 Cubans have traveled to 165 countries for that purpose. “One of the opinion matrices is that they are deceived and obliged,” he added. “It’s totally false.”
“There was a time when the passports of the collaborators were in the hands of the headquarters of the brigades: everything was very massive and many collaborators came out and we were lost,”
It is true, he said, that their passport was once retained, to avoid – with little practical effect – defectionsalthough he does not use the term during his speech and gives a confusing explanation. “There was a time when the passports of the collaborators were in the hands of the headquarters of the brigades: everything was very massive and many collaborators came out and we were lost,” he explained, without clarifying who were lost, if the documents or doctors. “We have been eliminating this issue.”
He assured that they do not punish those who have refused to leave. “There is not a single case,” he said. Portal also commented on the financial motivations to leave. He claimed that the medical brigades contributed money to the State, but that the economic benefit felt much more on a personal level, in the families of each doctor, than in the national economy.
“We care about our workers,” said Computed Portal: “We don’t want Kenya to happen to us.” It refers to the kidnapping, six years ago, from Landy Rodríguez and Assel Herrera, whose death in an alleged US bombing was announced by the Somali jihadists who took them, although it has not been possible to confirm the fact with other sources. In a recent statementThe Foreign Ministry said it was still immersed in the “search for answers.”
Portal presumed other figures: the number of foreign doctors who were formed in Cuba –87,980, from 150 countries – which served as forced to the Honduran official, Luther Castillo, who was connected by videoconferencing, to exalt the Cuban health system and refuse that the formation is of poor quality. Castillo, Fidel Castro’s personal friend and an unconditional regime, was in charge of presiding over the Cuban Brigade that marched to Haiti in 2010.
Fully folded to the Diaz-Canel version, Castillo’s intervention soon became an ignition allegation
Fully folded to the Diaz-Canel version, Castillo’s intervention soon became an ignition allegation that resorted to sentimental reasons rather than political. His summary: Honduras, whose government is today an important ally of Havana, will continue to allow the entry of Cuban doctors. “We don’t need to justify ourselves,” he finished.
Washington announced at the end of February the expansion of visa restrictions Against individuals involved in what he considers “labor exploitation” of Cuban workers abroad, including foreign governments officials.
According to the US and several international organizations, the practices of the Cuban government, which retains a substantial part – between 70% and 90% – of salaries paid to doctors and limits – among other things – their mobility, constitute a form of human trafficking.
