September 2014

Let Cuba Live1160 Atlantic Highway, Warren, Maine 04864 ( 207) 691-0322 www.letcubalive.org. January 2014

Continued Page 3 Continued Page 7

Judy Robbins of Sedgwick Maine contributesthree reports to this newsletter based on the visitshe and husband Peter Robbins made to Cuba inJuly as participants in this year’s version of theIFCO/Pastors for Peace FriendshipmentCaravan. Rev. Lucius Walker, the late founder ofPastors for Peace, launched the FriendshipmentCaravans for the sake of a “People’s ForeignPolicy.” Each year Caravan participants travelto Cuba taking humanitarian goods, againstU.S. rules. For information about the Caravans,go to the Pastors for Peace web site atwww.ifconews.org.

Former Cuban President Fidel Castro, in his September1st essay “Ideas of justice will triumph - or else disaster”laments the state of the world: “I think that absolutely noone has the right to destroy cities; murder children;pulverize homes; sow terror, hunger and death anywhere.In what corner of the world can such acts be justified?”He laments, but also offers ideas of justice.In July and August, as members of the delegation of thePastors for Peace Friendshipment to Cuba, weobserved these ideas in action and in development. Thiswas our 10th visit to Cuba over a 20-year period. Ateach visit we are renewed by witnessing the projects ofthe Cuban Revolution, projects based not on privateprofit, but on meeting human needs in every sphere. Wevisited the largest psychiatric hospital in Cuba, wherewe were treated to an exceptionally beautiful culturalperformance by patients, doctors and staff. We talked

The 25th Caravan to CubaBy Judy Robbins

Speak out! No more Silence! Free theCuban Five prisoners!

Let Cuba Live is part of the worldwide movement tofree the Cuban Five political prisoners from US jails.The FBI arrested them 16 years ago, on September 12,1998. We say, “Let them go!”Let Antonio Guerrero, Ramón Labañino, and GerardoHernández leave prison and return to their families andhomeland. Already Fernando Gonzalez and RenéGonzález, convicted on lesser charges and having servedshorter sentences, are back in Cuba.The prisoners’ appeals process has ended. The onlyrecourse remaining for those still in prison is for PresidentObama to pardon and free them.The Five caused no harm to the US government or theU. S. people. Their job had been to monitor private anddangerous paramilitary thugs in Florida, criminals whofor years had brought terror, death, and destruction toCuba. What was a sovereign state to do but to try todefend itself?The prisoners are victims of injustice: two life terms forGerardo, 30 years for Ramón, and almost 22 years forAntonio. Foreign agents spying against the United Statesgovernment usually receive far shorter sentences. TheUS government took pains to railroad the Cuban Fiveto prison. US taxpayer money ended up in the hands ofMiami-area journalists who, thus encouraged, producednews stories prejudiced enough to influence bothcommunity and jury.The prisoners and their families are principled, admirablepeople. We of Let Cuba Live have known them overmany years through their words. We have met with familymembers in Cuba and several times have visited one ofthe Five in prison. We’ve been with his family from Cubawhen they visit him in prison.In 2002, former Cuban President Fidel Castro indicatedwhat must be done. The Cuban Five would go free only“when the enormous injustice committed against them isknown throughout the whole world.”Family members travel the world to promote solidaritywith the Five. Ailí Labañino, Ramón’s daughter, was inAustralia in August 2014. An interviewer there askedher, “What has it been like to have your father imprisonedin such unjust circumstances?”Ailí’s reply: “More than half of my life, as well as that ofmy sisters, has been spent in this battle for the return ofmy father. We are very proud to know what they did

At their graduation in July,2014 from the Latin American Schoolof Medicine, Joanna Mae Sommers of New York and ParastouMalek of California pose with their Cuban medical schoolprofessor.

Med

icc.

org

phot

o

September 2014Page 2

Mainers Ken Kohl and Maria Sanchez in Washington forthe Five, June, 2014

Bill H

ackwell phot o

Let Cuba Live is an organization of Mainepeople who for 22 years have worked politicallyfor U.S. – Cuban relations based on fairness,international law, and mutual respect. We call forthe anti-Cuban U.S. economic blockade to go, forU.S. citizens to be able freely to travel to Cuba,for the release of the three remaining CubanFive political prisoners, and for the United Statesto leave Guantanamo Bay. We of Let Cuba Livetry to inform fellow citizens and elected officialsabout Cuba. We work at building solidarity withpeople on the island. Let Cuba Live joins otheractivists and solidarity groups in challengingwrongheaded U.S. Cuban policies.Join us. We meet each month either in person orby telephone. For information call (207) 691 –0322 or (207) 443-2899. Visit our web site atwww.letcubalive.org.

USAID: nonsense and disgraceBy Ricardo Alarcón de QuesadaMr. Alarcón recently retired as president of Cuba’sNational Assembly. Formerly he served as Cuba’sambassador to the United Nations. The articleappears in Spanish at: http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=188894&titular=usaid:-infamia-y-disparates. W. T. Whitney Jr. did the translation.A Prussian ProphecyMaybe some people think Otto von Bismark was bitterwhen he said, “God created a special providence to shelterfools, drunks, and the United States of America.” Othersmight think, however, that such a humorous remark morethan a century ago when very little was known aboutthat country was a biting prophesy of what would developafterwards in the behavior of the new empire over thecourse of the 20th century and into the 21st.I remembered the phrase on reading about RepublicanSenator Jeff Flake who critiqued the most recent anti-

detailing the true role of Alan Gross, then in prison inCuba. The official North American propaganda hadpresented Gross as if he had come to help the CubanJewish community gain Internet access. Such deceit wasrepeated even despite an emphatic, specific denial byleaders of that community who, in addition to Internet,had very cordial and respectful relations with Cubanauthorities. The article included secret communicationsbetween Gross and his handlers in which they explicitlyacknowledged the illegal and subversive nature of hismission. Six days after Gross’ arrest, USAID introducedthis new project of recruiting Cuban youths. The Agency,incidentally, put Creative Associates International incharge. This time, the news agency revealed secretpapers that contained guidelines for clandestinecommunications, reports the young conspirators sentback, and the orientation they received. AP interviewedsome of the new spies from Costa Rico, Venezuela, andPeru, as well as several Cubans who were “recruited.”

The operation looked like it came from a cheap newspaperserial. The Latin Americans were trained, according tothe AP report, through abbreviated courses, barely aweek long. There they learned techniques for searchingout and choosing candidates for more complicatedsubversive tasks later on. They gained familiarity withencrypted language codes for communicating with thosein charge on the outside. To accomplish their mission,they went to Cuba claiming to be interested in helpingCubans do community work in order to improve theirliving conditions. In interchanges with the recipients of“aid” they would identify those complaining aboutdifficulties and shortcomings of everyday life, befriendthem, and try to shape them as future opposition leaders.Surely those who conceived of the idea were unawarethat for many years tens of thousands of Cuban youngpeople have gone to those countries and others to helpdevelop programs of medical care, education, culture,and sports, among others, that contribute to saving andimproving lives. Governments and specializedinternational organizations like the World Health

Cuban actions of the Agency for InternationalDevelopment (USAID). Sarcastically he said that,“These programs are in desperate need of adultsupervision.” The legislator was referring to the detailed,comprehensive investigative reporting by the AssociatedPress about the secret program of sending young LatinAmericans to Cuba in order to recruit young people there,organize them, and convert them into a force capable ofbringing down the revolutionary government.

A little earlier AP had revealed another USAID plan,oneusing as sub-contractor something called CreativeAssociates International. Through trickery they puttogether a subversive cell phone network calledZunZuneo.” And just before that, there was a report

September 2014Page 3

The 25th Caravan to Cuba, cont. from page 1with the founding director of ELAM, Cuba’s LatinAmerican School of Medicine, a school that now in its16th year boasts 21,500 graduates and educates studentsfrom 124 countries (including this year 114 from theUS). This 6-year program is provided at no cost to thestudents. We met with community activists who workwith inner city children on prevention of bullying, andon meeting the social needs of former prisoners andfamilies of prisoners. We visited the CESERSE Centerin Varadero Beach, which hosts groups of children whoare disabled or suffering chronic disease, as well asnursing home residents, and provides them with a beachvacation. We toured a 25-acre organic garden,employing 125 workers, 80% of whose products aredistributed locally. We met with church leaders whoadminister social programs for the elderly and infirmand educate the community about homophobia. Wetoured the Labiofam facility, Havana’s biotechnologycenter, and learned of their international work ineradicating diseases. We were invited to extraordinaryperformances by children’s groups: choral, ethnic andmodern dancing, and musical theater. We shared inneighborhood celebrations on July 26th, Cuba’s nationalholiday.Fidel closed his essay thus: “Would it not be preferableto struggle to produce food … build hospitals andschools for billions of human beings who desperatelyneed them; promote art and culture; struggle againstepidemics … or finally eliminate illnesses like cancer,Ebola, malaria, dengue, chikungunya, diabetes andothers? If today it is possible to prolong life, health andthe productive time of persons, if it is perfectly possibleto plan the development of the population in accordancewith growing productivity, culture and development ofhuman values, what are they waiting for to do so?”

Conversations with Fernando GonzalezBy Judy RobbinsIn July we met Fernando GonzalezLlort, the second prisoner of theuban Five to be released and allow-ed to return home to Cuba. Sincehis return he has been appointedto the position of vice-presidentof the Cuban Institute for Friend-ship with the Peoples (ICAP),an invaluable resource for inter-national groups visiting the island.We first encountered Fernando at a cultural gala atWilliam Carey Baptist Church in Havana, put on tocelebrate the arrival of the Pastors for Peacedelegation. Seated in the audience, he was called onstage to be serenaded, guaracha-style, by a children’schoral group.A few days later we met Fernando in Artemisa on theoccasion of Cuba’s national holiday, celebrated on July26. He was part of the official program that alsoincluded President Raul Castro and Ramiro Valdez,both survivors of anti-government attacks in Santiagoon July 26th 1953, widely regarded as the beginning ofCuba’s revolution. Valdez gave the keynote address.Later Fernando worked his way through the crowd togreet the Pastors for Peace group, the VenceremosBrigade, a delegation from Puerto Rico, and others.We encountered Fernando Gonzalez later in the week,this time in a sugar cane field, as he moved throughthe rows in the hot sun, weeding the cane and talkingwith the workers. Later there was an officialgathering, at which he spoke about the Cuban Fivepolitical prisoners and responded to questions. Themeeting took place at ICAP’s camp for foreignvisitors near Havana. ICAP President Kenia Serranojoined Fernando at the camp.Fernando affirmed that it was an honor to haveworked in the fields with Pastors for Peace andshared with friends. The encounter was “of greatsignificance,” he said, adding that while there wascontact with nature, “maybe we were not tooproductive.” He discussed the potential of negotiatingwith the Obama administration for a prisonerexchange involving the Five. “We know,” heemphasized, “that the remaining three prisoners willcome back.”At the meeting, Manolo de los Santos, a Pastors forPeace staff member, stated that “The Five is the caseof our generation. We grew up politically with thiscause. We have done everything we can in the courts;we must take it back to the streets and force Obamato sign a release.”Concluding, Fernando Gonzalez referred to U. S.occupation of Guantanamo as “a gross offence, aninhuman offence to all Cubans.” Referring to changesongoing now in Cuba, Gonzalez indicated, “This is howwe Cubans live: we strive to correct our mistakes andimprove our socialist project.”

From left to right: Judy Robbins, Fernando Gonzalez, GailWalker (Pastors for Peace co-director), Peter Robbins.

September 2014Page 4

The financial report for the first half of the year in Cubawas not good news. GDP had grown less than 1%,well below projections. According to Cubaneconomists, this is due to several internal problems thatmake the economy less efficient. Sugar did not meetgoals, because of organizational and climate problems;one of two nickel-producing plants was shut downbecause it was not cost-effective; tourism revenues didnot rise to hoped-for levels, possibly due to theeconomic crisis and restrictions. Thus, of a 2.2% GDPplanned for the year, the current reality looks like 1.4%.Added to this blow, debt payments will increase.What is to be done? Cuban economist Nidia AlfonsoCuevas provided the Pastors for Peace delegation withan overview of the current concerns and the Cubangovernment’s plans. “Revenue is very difficult. Securinginternational credit is problematic for Cuba as is payingthe usual interest. We are under-developed and havefew natural or material resources.”Alfonso added: “So the Cuban government has todecide, what is the priority? Money invested is notalways showing up in the standard of living of the Cubanpeople. That standard needs to increase as well asdevelopment. People have an average education of highschool or early university. Expectations are high. 70%of the population has lived always under blockade.There is the sense that difficulties are persisting. But thespirit is not killed; there is still hopefulness for solvingproblems.”The economy is now facing these specific challenges:one, maintain the people’s standard of living; two, paydebts to trading partners to continue credit relationships;three, development.The Cuban economic structure has moved from

could be dedicated to the tourist sector, resulting inimprovement of the environment and easing of traffic.Mariel Port could be a bridge between Latin Americaand Europe; already there are important tradeagreements. The recent visits of Russian PresidentVladmir Putin and the Chinese President Xi Jinping haveresulted in two new trade agreements. “But this is notthe final solution, because the international market stillrelies on U. S. dollars, oil in particular. Therefore Cubaneeds to find alternatives,” said Alfonso.Asked about socialist versus capitalist models, Alfonsoreplied, “It was easier to be socialist when the Sovietbloc existed, but it also led away from Cuba’sdevelopment in energy and technology. Legislation in1995 was directed at investment in technology, capital,and markets.” She noted also that, “the vision ofcapitalism is far from Cuban moral values.”Alfonso indicated statistics may not give the right ideasabout what the Cuban system is aimed at. She used theexample of children afflicted with leukemia. Despitecosts and difficulties, “the children will receive themedicines and food they need wherever they reside.The state ensures personalized care.” She concludedby saying that, “Traditional economic models will notsolve our problems, but we need to be familiar withthem to make the most of what possibilities we have.We are trying to play with capitalist rules to maintainour socialist model.”

Changes to the Cuban Economic ModelBy Judy Robbins

Economist Nidia Alfonso speaks to delgation.

agriculture to industry, in particular biotechnology andfood products; here the climate offers a competitiveadvantage. Biotechnology ensures health parametersand adds to exports. Diagnostic equipment is beingdeveloped, plus pharmaceuticals.Other models of development, such as the MarielInternational Port Facility, now under construction,provide for ships, factories, and added value products.“Foreign investment is required,” Alfonso states.“Investors must be willing to circumvent the blockade,or have such strong businesses that the blockade can’ttouch them.” With the new port in place, Havana port

Pete

r R

obbi

ns P

hoto

Pastors for Peace, Venceremos Brigade, with sugar cane workers.

Pete

r R

obbi

ns p

hoto

September 2014Page 5

Exploring current participation offormerly excluded CubansBy Tom Whitney, August 28, 2014

Teresa Amarelle Boué, Secretary General of the Federa-tion of Cuban Women, which celebrated its 54th anniver-sary on August 23, 2014. Photo courtesy of EcuRed.cu

Not least among achievements of Cuba’s socialistrevolution is expanded political participation, evenexercise of power, among formerly disadvantagedgroups. Rafael Hernández, editor of the Cuban journal“Temas,” detailed this story recently on the PupilaInsomne web site. He studied participation and entryinto leadership positions in terms of age, gender, race,and profession.Hernández advances Cuban Communist Party (PCC)membership as a measure of political participation.The combined membership of the PCC and Union ofYoung Communists (UJC) numbered 1,175,148 in2012 - 22.1 percent of Cuba’s labor force that year.Of PCC members, 35 percent are of African descent,a figure equal to Hernández’s estimate of the proportionof African-descended people among all Cubans. Afro-Cubans make up 42 percent of UJC members.Women make up 39 percent of party members and52 percent of UJC members. The median age of PCCmembers is 50. Large numbers of Cubans thus seemto be politically active, and former disadvantagedgroups are participating in numbers proportional totheir presence in the general population. The questionof whether or not they are moving into high politicalpositions prompted Hernández to look at who leadsin the PCC and Cuban state.For example, 114 members of the PCC CentralCommittee have a median age of 57 years; 42 percentare women, and 31.5 percent are non-white. Thosefilling PCC leadership roles overwhelmingly areeconomists, engineers, and teachers. The average ageof 16 PCC provincial first secretaries is 46; six arewomen, and 25 percent are non-white. Generally, 28.6percent of PCC leaders in Cuba’s provinces are Afro-Cuban.

At high levels of Party leadership old patterns persist.The average age of 14 members of the PCC’s PoliticalBureau (PB) is 68.6. Only one is a woman. Four areeither black or of “mixed race.” At a lower level of PCCleadership, the six members of the Party Secretariatinclude two who are non-white and one woman; theirmedian age is 60.The National Assembly of People’s Power,constitutionally the “supreme organ of state power,”warrants first consideration regarding leadership of theCuban state. The average age of 614 Assembly delegatesis 49. Women make up 45.25 percent of them. Over 35percent are of African heritage. Two National Assemblyvice-presidents are women as are half the presidents of16 provincial assembles and 45 percent of provincialassembly delegates.

The National Assembly elects the Council of State (CS)which legislates between sessions of the NationalAssembly. CS members in 2013, 31 in all, included 13women and 12 Afro-Cubans. The Council of Ministers(CM), charged with executing and administeringlegislation, comprises 33 members of whom 25 percentare women. Of eight CM vice-presidents, five are morethan 70 years of age; there are no women.

Hernández notes a disparity between restricted entry intohigh leadership positions and ready openings at lowerorganizational levels. But characteristics of peopleentering the PB, CS, and CM during President RaulCastro’s two terms suggest to him change is on the way.They are relatively young, mostly civilian, and withexperience – some of them – in provincial leadershipposts.

There is a cautionary note: “data reveal a greater presenceof relatively disadvantaged groups … in key areas of thesystem” …‘professionals’ are now the “most numeroussocio-occupational group… rising to become 41.6percent of PCC members … [C]hildren of those workersand peasants, thanks to social mobility … have beenconverted into a new social group that thinks differentlyabout things, socialism included.”

Phot

o co

urte

sy o

f E

cuR

ed.c

u

Antonio Maceo, anAfrican-descended rebelgeneral in Cuba’sindpendence wars,became a hero for blacksin the United States

Phot

o fr

om w

ww

.cad

enag

ram

onte

.cu

Continued Page 8

September 2014Page 6

Organization, Pan-American Health Organization, andUNESCO recognize this.

They didn’t seem to realize that if Cuba has anything,it’s people expressing opinions openly and criticizingerrors and shortcomings in their lives. They do so in thepress, in meetings with elected delegates, and ingatherings of their social and work organizations. Theydo it, really, every day - everywhere. They do it because

\

and beatings, and putting protesters in prison are storiesfrom the past that only their grandparents lived through.

The perfect pretext

Fernando Murillo from Costa Rica, one of the operation’sleaders, made several trips to Cuba. He told AP abouttraveling through Santa Clara with guys that played hiphop and rap and expressed themselves artistically in otherways. He was pleased the encounters qualified as “theperfect pretext” for implementing his plan, which was toorganize a workshop on preventing HIV-AIDS, althoughhe refused to provide details. Allegedly he had acommitment to confidentiality he signed with hisemployers. He would only say, “He was teaching peoplehow to use condoms correctly.” The State Departmentspokesperson was more talkative. He defended the plan,but acknowledged that besides supposedly fighting AIDS,Murillo was there for subversive reasons.

He left out saying that, years back, Cuba had to confrontthat sickness with no help from the United States and inthe face of a cruel blockade denying us access to essentialretroviral drugs being produced exclusively in the

USAID: nonsense and disgrace, cont. from page 2

most Cubans born after 1959 and have gotten used toeducation and health care being universally available,They regard social assistance and security as inalienablerights, even while they were waiting to be born. Andbesides, for them, police assaults on their learning centers,

A new beginning?

Ever since 1959, Washington has tried unsuccessfullyto destroy the Cuban Revolution. They’ve triedeverything – economic war, military intervention,subversion, and non-stop hostile propaganda. (...)

The plans we denounce here are a continuation of a longsaga of aggressions in which bits of nonsense often goalong with crimes. The current administration concoctedand promoted the most recent ones. A little after beinginstalled in the White House, President Obama announcedthere would be “a new beginning” in policies toward

Ricardo Alarcon, photo courtesy of granma.cu

neighboring country’s laboratories. At that early stage,Cuba’s few patients found relief for their sufferingthrough the solidarity help of NGO’s and individuals.Economic war imposed on us since 1964 restrictsmedicines and medical equipment and instruments. Allgovernmental agencies helped implement this genocidalpolicy, including USAID.

Over time Cuba not only began to produce the retroviralswe need and was able to maintain its free health caresystem, but also introduced a special program forseropositive people through which 90 percent of themsurvived – and under decent conditions. Cuba is one ofthe countries least affected by that illness. Its prevalencerate on the island is 0.2 percent; in Latin America, 0.4percent; in the United States and Canada, 0.6 percent.As for young people 15 to 19 years of age, the Cubanfigure – 0.2 percent – is the lowest in the Americas, andCuba became the first country in the region certified ashaving eliminated congenital transmission of syphilis andAIDS.

Of course governments of the United States do havetheir right to show off ignorance and act like fools anddrunkards, as the Prussian would say. But it’s anunpardonable disgrace to coarsely mess up the healthand lives of everybody else.

Let Cuba Live member Loukie Lofchie at Friendshipmentsend-off, Brunswick, ME, July 8, 2014.

Reg

is Tr

embl

ey p

hoto

September 2014Page 7

Speak Out, cont. from page 1was not only for theirfamilies but for all Cubans.Anyway, it’s very painfulnot to have them, for inst-ance at birthday parties,on Valentine’s Day, onFathers’ Day” “Truly, international solidarity isvital in this battle,” sheadded; “Cuba’s efforts are reaching the world throughthe efforts of our friends inthe world. The mass media have silenced the case.That is why we have to knock on every door we canto take the message to every person.”

The prisoners are determined. Gerardo Hernández,serving two life sentences, promised years ago, “Aslong as there is just one person fighting for my causeand the cause of my brothers, we will remain stronginside these prisons.”

And optimistic: “If I think about myself,” Ramón tolda reporter recently, “time does not pass. When Ithink of my daughters becoming women, when I lookinto the eyes of my beloved Eli, time becomes infinitefor me, cruel, implacable. At that point I go back toanother time, one of laughter and joys, of return andhappiness, to the precious time of our future, free inCuba.” And, “I see Cuba, a beach blue, clean, anddazzling. I see Eli, my daughters, all my family, mypeople. I see laughter, joy, eternity. That way I makemy freedom tangible and real. And I know it’scertain.”

Immigration reform and the CubanAdjustment ActBy Keith Bolender, August 11, 2014 This importantarticle appeared in Progreso Weekly. We presentexcerpts here.While desperate children cross the American borderfrom troubled Central American countries, leaders inthe United States continue to demonstrate that no issue,no matter how emotionally charged or morally clear, isbeyond politics. And there is one group that is particularlyadept at duplicity when determining which immigrantsdeserve to be treated better than others.

The crisis has brought to the forefront a set ofCongresspersons who believe that children sent by theirparents from Honduras, Guatemala and Salvador to theUnited States in the hopes of a better life have to besent back unequivocally, lest these unfortunates getaway with flaunting the laws and take advantage ofAmerican generosity – which they apparently do notdeserve.

Politicians, in large part from the Republican Party, havemade it clear these children should not receive specialconsideration, regardless of the physical dangers oreconomic depravations they left in their home countries.Two from the Grand Old Party have been particularlyvociferous in their determination to keep the immigrationdoor closed for certain Latinos. Senators Ted Cruz fromTexas and Florida’s Marco Rubio represent the hardestopponents of leniency towards these refugees (…).

What makes the position of Cruz and Rubio particularlydisconcerting is that both come from an immigrationbackground – specifically from a country where theseimmigrants are given special consideration – Cuba(…).Cubans who make it to the USA are not onlywelcomed, but accepted with open arms full ofeconomic and political benefits. (…) This is madepossible under the decades old Cuban Adjustment Act,implemented in 1966 as part of America’s politicalweaponry against the revolution. The Act was designedto encourage Cubans to leave the island, providingincentives such as permanent residence status after oneyear. Cubans simply have to show up at any Americanborder, no questions asked, and they are allowed entryafter a cursory examination. Immediately they can applyfor social assistance programs, claim various financialbenefits and be provided with considerations such asfree English lessons.The Act encourages Cubans to claim political refugeestatus, with the person only having to assert some ill-treatment at the hands of the revolutionary governmentto ensure there would be no complications upon entry.(…) In reality, Cuba provides far more social programsand personal security, despite the economic specialperiod they’ ve suffered during the past 25 years, thando most Central American countries. But it is the Cubanimmigrant who obtains all the benefits, while others aredemonized and sent back (…).

Can

berr

a A

mig

os d

e C

uba

phot

o

Ailí Labañino in Australiab

24 Years - UN Votes on the need to end the Embargo.

September 2014Printed at Creative Media • Norway, Maine

Cuba exports health care,gains recognitionBy Tom WhitneyPress conferences and new reports in Cuba recentlycelebrated the ten-year anniversary of Operation Miracle,known also as “Mision Miracle,” which occurred on July8. This project directed at restoring vision for peoples inmany nations took shape within the context of ALBA,the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America.

Cuba and Venezuela launched ALBA in late 2004. LatinAmerican and Caribbean nations belonging to ALBAengage in mutually beneficial “solidarity exchanges” ofeducational and medical services, scientific projects, evencommodities.

Initially, under Operation Miracle, Cubans andVenezuelans benefited from surgical eye care, as didtens of thousands of foreign nationals who’ve traveledto Cuba for treatment. Then Cuban ophthalmologistsserving in Venezuela took the lead in establishing 26 eyecare centers throughout that country. Staff consisting ofeye surgeons, nurses, technicians, and other physiciansserved both Venezuelans and visually - impaired peoplefrom 17 Latin American countries plus Italy, Portugal,and Puerto Rico. Organizers have since establishedcenters in 14 Latin American and Caribbean nations.Ten years after its start the project operates in 31countries, some in Africa and Asia.

Operation Miracle has provided no –cost diagnosis andtreatment. The most common diagnosis by far iscataracts. The teams have improved or restored visionfor 3.4 million people, according to Cubadebate.org.

Haiti is another success story. More than 11,000 Cubanhealth workers, mostly physicians, have served there formore than 16 year, and 700 of them are there now.

Cuba’s Latin American School of Medicine has graduatedover 23,000 young doctors from 83 countries in the Ameri-cas, Africa and Asia since its first class of 2005.

Cub

adeb

ate.

cu p

hoto

Almost two million Cuban children began a new school yearon September 1, 2014. That week a World Bank report oneducation in Latin America said: “No teaching force in theregion today (except possibly Cuba’s) can be considered ofhigh quality.”

According to sociologist Frank T. Fitzgerald’s 1994book “The Cuban Revolution in Crisis,” one object ofCuba’s “rectification” campaign of the 1980s.was to“usher in a transformation of Cuba’s administrativepersonnel [for the sake of] formally educating orreplacing the political cadres who had risen tointermediate level posts on the basis of politicalcredentials in the 1960s.” There would be “an increasingnumber of formally trained personnel, that is, of newprofessionals [who] would be supplied by a dramaticexpansion of education, especially at thesecondary and higher levels.”

Finally, Hernández’ data on women’s role within Cubansociety are astounding: “[W]omen now make up 70percent of workers in justice institutions, 77.8 percentof prosecutors, 60 percent of physicians, and 70percent of teachers at every educational level. [And]50 percent of graduates in natural sciences andmathematics, 70 percent of economics graduates, 65percent of graduates in social sciences and humanities,and 75 percent of graduating physicians are women.”

Exploring current participation of formerlyexcluded Cubans, continued from Page 5

They’ve cared for 20 million patients, performed 373,000surgical operations, and delivered 150,000 babies.Over1300 Haitian young people, recipients of Cubangovernment scholarships, have graduated from Cubanuniversities Currently 322 Haitians are studying medicinein Cuba.

Dr. Margaret Chan, Director – General of the WorldHealth Organization, visited Cuba in July. She observedthat, “The objective of science is to serve health careand health and in this, Cuba is an example.” She lauded“the Cuban purpose of benefiting not only the health ofCubans but also of the citizens of Latin America and therest of the world.”

Phot

o fro

m r

adio

rebe

lde.

cu