MIAMI, United States. — Contrary to what many may think, the sale of human and animal blood has been one of the businesses carried out by the Cuban regime in recent decades. Although it is a practice that is not exclusive to Cuba, on the island it is carried out without the knowledge of the citizens.
In 2012 the Uruguayan newspaper The country reported that the blood business represented the first export product from Cuba to Uruguay. According to the newspaper, the South American country paid nearly one million dollars (USD $0.9 million) for the aforementioned product.
The Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC, for its acronym in English), a data visualization site for international trade, indicates that between 1995 and 2007 the business of selling human and animal blood from Cuba reported to the Island some USD $796 million.
The information adds that among the main buyers of the blood exported by the Cuban regime are countries such as Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, South Africa and Colombia.
Red Gold
It is estimated that in 2014 the human and animal blood that Cuba sold represented 1.8% of the country’s exports, according to statistics from the Observatory of Economic Complexity itself.
Official figures show that Cubans make some 400,000 voluntary blood donations annually, a task that involves several so-called “mass organizations,” including the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR).
The Archivo Cuba platform revealed that in the 1960s, the Cuban regime began to forcefully extract blood from its prisoners, a model that was already used by the former German Democratic Republic (GDR).
Receive information from CubaNet on your cell phone through WhatsApp. Send us a message with the word “CUBA” on the phone +1 (786) 316-2072, You can also subscribe to our electronic newsletter by giving click here.
