Speaking to the press, Martinez, who is a member of the American College of Cardiology and works at the Morristown Medical Center in New Jersey, said that there is much to learn from Cuban medicine, which in addition to being provided free of charge despite financial limitations, manages to do a great deal for the health of the nation’s inhabitants.

“Cuba’s results in the field of Cardiology are fabulous, and should be known by the world scientific community,” Dr. Martinez said, who noted the quality of Cuban specialists who have the ability to serve everyone who needs treatment.

He insisted that it is important to come to Cuba to events like this, to share and exchange common experiences in the field of Cardiology, because we have the same problems with cholesterol, arrhythmias, damage caused to smokers, and other pathologies that affect the heart.

The gathering of some 400 specialists was also attended by Professor Giovanni Pedrazzini, president of the Swiss Society of Cardiology, who highlighted the quality of Cuban medicine, which amidst many limitations maintains all its services.

During a presentation offered within the framework of the event, Pedrazzini said that if something merits attention in the case of Cuba, it is the joint work of its institutions that, despite limited resources, make the most of the country’s indisputable medical talent.

When the institution was founded in 2003, the rate was 1.7 per thousand live births, which has been progressively reduced by more than 50%, the clearest expression of the scope of the genetics program, which serves 95 to 99% of pregnant women and newborns in all prenatal and neonatal care programs.

Dr. Hilda Roblejo Balbuena, a specialist in Clinical Genetics, Assistant Professor, researcher, and head of Teaching and Research at this institution, said that this improvement is the result work done by the National Network of Medical Genetics Services with provincial departments and municipal services, and at the level of neighborhood polyclinics, adequately equipped, both in human and technological resources.

Also important is the fact that this institution – the national reference center for diagnosis, management, and prevention of genetic diseases and congenital defects – has managed to expand the availability of diagnoses for genetic diseases from about 40 in 2003, to more than 120 today. This has been possible with the addition of new laboratory techniques for the comprehensive study of infertile couples, also a priority for Cuban public health.

Dr. Roblejo added, “The molecular diagnosis of family breast cancer and family colon cancer, which implies the standardization of studies to identify individuals with a greater predisposition for these diseases, for preventive purposes,” constitutes another special priority for the National Center of Medical Genetics

These are pathologies that are among the leading causes of death and morbidity in Cuba. The genetic risk factors associated with the most common causes of death in all populations: cardiovascular disease and cancer, as well as reproductive disorders (infertility) … indicate the need for a genetic culture with an increasingly preventive approach, which is, at the same time, the intervention strategy recognized as the most effective in the short and medium term,” she said.

(Granma)

Leaning on the urban garden fence, foreman César Santí listens to her as he advances with a bunch of green beans in hand, just picked from the beds.

“Take these, doctor, so you can keep moving. You’re headed to your Sunday shift. How many Cuban doctors, here and outside the country, are doing the same thing today? Then Trump and his cronies come along spending millions to show that they are “slaves,” victims of “trafficking.” No way…”

“Thank you, César», Zoila says as she hurries on, but turning around after just three steps, she goes back to add, “What you were saying… this is pure cynicism from that government.”

Alongside the Bayamo urban garden, veteran José Antonio Martínez and César continue the discussion: “This Trump is a crazy! All they have left is money, like always. They think they can buy anything, even to deny something evident. Cuba shares, serves, shows solidarity. So to attack us, the United States is obliged to invent something. Paying to fabricate lies about Cuba´s international collaboration is absurd and unacceptable.”

On this Sunday morning, the day before millions of children returned to schools where they are educated to become people of good will, without paying a penny, César concluded the reflection: “They spend millions to put Cuba on trial, when the whole world is witness to Cuba’s truth and the great U.S. lie.”CUBAN COLLABORATORS, A LIVING EXAMPLE OF SOLIDARITY AND LOVE”It’s logical that imperialism does not like us, because while their system destroys and plunders, Cuban collaborators in dozens of countries help millions and are blessed by the peoples of the world,” said Milagros López Frank, an outstanding nurse in Cienfuegos, with 37 years in the health care field and an internationalist collaborator in Angola between 2008 and 2011, and in Guatemala from 2015 to 2017.

She insists that Washington’s lies don´t matter because the truth is written by peoples of the world, and Cuban doctors, nurses, and technicians are loved by poor people in many countries, seeing in them the only possibility they have to get better when they’re sick.

Milagros passionately supports the Foreign Ministry’s recent statement condemning new U.S. measures against Cuba and asks herself if the empire would be capable of sending healthcare professionals to favelas, to villages in the Amazon, jungle settlements – everywhere Cubans go.

The question is rhetorical, she clarifies. She knows the answer. Only Cuba has the combination of altruism, love, and humanism (and skill) to take on such a noble task.

“We do more than cure patients in Latin America, Africa and Asia; we also educate for health, fundamental for marginalized populations.”

Julio Marcial Hidalgo, studying Management of Socio-cultural Development at the University of Cienfuegos, insists on the irrationality of a system, which has plundered the world’s human and material resources, accusing one of the planet´s most generous countries of trafficking in persons and slavery.

He emphasizes the importance of knowing history. The United States established itself as an empire with annexations, purchases, and appropriation of huge areas. It’s armies have landed on all continents and the harm done local populations was no more than “collateral damage,” he adds. Meanwhile, he continues, our country -poor and blockaded by the U.S. – shares and shows solidarity.

PROUD TO REPAY OUR DEBT TO HUMANITY

The daughter of a patient who no longer lives in Cuba, once told him, “Doctor, if you lived in the United States, you would be a millionaire,” but Higinio Hernández, a maxillofacial surgeon from Pinar del Río insisted that neither the lectures he presented in Switzerland and Germany, or his missions in Guyana and Venezuela, would ever make him forget his roots.

He didn’t hesitate to respond, “If I were born somewhere else – Black, from a poor family – I would probably not be a doctor today.” With more than 30 years of experience. Dr. Hernández has, in addition to his surgical and teaching mastery, the gratitude of thousands of patients, as the best testimony to his dedication.

Maria is a name we hear in countless stories, but that is what people called the woman in the Venezuelan state of Mérida who lived 10 years with neuralgic pain, which he could only treat with analgesics and acupuncture. But he doesn’t remember the name of the patient whose eyelids he surgically repaired, or the elderly woman whose face he reconstructed.

“I cannot accept anyone questioning the quality of Cuban medicine, or the humanist training of our professionals,” he said, referring to the U.S. campaign.

“We are not anyone’s slaves, and we are not forced to work in other countries. Fidel said once that being an internationalist is repaying our debt to humanity, and I agree with him. That’s why we are proud to be able to help other peoples, and proud that our medicine is not based on mercantile interests, but on the vocation to serve human beings.”

A specialist in Internal Medicine since 1991, Dr. Juan Carlos Hernández had a similar thought: “I have completed missions in South Africa, Botswana, Dominica, and I can say that I have worked hard, but I have never felt oppressed or enslaved. On the contrary, one develops as a doctor and learns,” he stated.

His specialty means that he must often deal with death, face to face. “In South Africa I met many patients with HIV, who had no way to buy the little medicine that existed at that time to treat the disease.”Dr. Miriela Mesa still keeps in touch with patients she assisted for three years in Venezuela: “People are generally grateful. Outside of Cuba, one works just like we do here or maybe a little more, but no one pressures us to go; there isn’t a single doctor who leaves the country against their will.

”This is the case of Nora María Lemus, who despite her vast experience as a specialist in Comprehensive General Medicine and Geriatrics and Gerontology, at León Cuervo Rubio Hospital in the city of Pinar del Río, has never had the desire to work outside of Cuba.

“Now that my children are grown, I may do it, but at the time, when it was proposed, I explained that for family reasons I was not a good fit, and they understood.“No one has ever questioned my decision, and no one has ever reprimanded me.

On the contrary, I maintain my position and all my prerogatives as a doctor.”This September 2, when Cuban schools open their doors for a new school year, other doors in many corners of the world also open to extend the supportive and generous arm of Cuba to the dispossessed.

And of course, most internationalist doctors work in conditions that are not the best. It is not possible to install an ideal clinic on stilts driven into the banks of a river in Amazonia, or within stone walls on a cold Andean slope that provide some protection for villagers.

Just as the habit does not make the monk, it is not the luxury hospital that determines the quality of medical care. No one will be, for example, more of a doctor than the one who saved hundreds in Haiti from death, under a tent set up amidst the rubble and dust in the air, after the terrible earthquake; or the doctor who overcame “by the skin of his teeth” an Ebola infection while saving others, and then returned to the front line of battle, to risk his second chance at life to give his love to others.

If this is the accusation, and altruism a crime, then Cuba is guilty. Their millions are wasted. Money that goes out into the world to buy lies, can never buy health or the sanctity of true medicine.

(Granma)

“More than 35,000 professionals from 136 countries have been trained in our universities, and 8,478 from 121 nations are currently studying. The positive impact on the lives of millions of people in tens of thousands of communities in Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean is unquestionable,” Portal stressed.

The Minister emphasized that these achievements have been possible despite the unjust and cruel economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the U.S. government for almost 60 years, which is currently intensifying and constitutes the main obstacle to the country’s development. .

Despite this, he said, “Cuba reiterates its commitment to share its experiences in the development of primary health care, making available to the World Health Organization and its member states, cooperation programs, medical universities for the training of professionals and technicians, the products of the medical-pharmaceutical and biotechnological industry, as a way of contributing to universal health coverage for all.”

(Granma)

Meanwhile, Qasim Al-Kazim’s dream of being a footballer was cut short when he lost one of his legs to a terrorist attack by the Islamic State. However, he survived and enjoyed the ultimate thrill when he was taken to Moscow, where he inaugurated, with the first kick of the ball, a soccer match between Russian teams Spartak and Ufa.

These are two examples of victims of the same killer: terrorism. Be it fundamentalist groups as in Iraq, or the wars and sanctions applied by the U.S. government, which should be judged as state terrorism.

Knowing that hundreds of thousands of children are affected every day by the wars or economic sanctions imposed by Washington against countries whose governments are not compatible with the model it wants to implement, is perhaps the most moving result of the latest actions by those who govern in the White House.

Here, in the 21st century, Venezuela, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Afghanistan – countries with energy resources or representing strategic points in U.S. geopolitics – are destabilized or see attempts to conquer them. Their infrastructure is destroyed and their economies strangled with cruel financial sanctions, as part of the imperialist plan to dominate the world.

Troops and sophisticated weapons have been sent to Afghanistan in search of the Taliban, who continue to dominate part of the vast country, one of the poorest on the planet. Besides massacring its president, Libya has been turned into a failed state, and even today nobody has control over it. Its oil brought with it foreign conquerors who are already enjoying it.

In Yemen, where according to the UN, 80% of the 24 million inhabitants need urgent aid, the number of children killed increased from 900 to more than 1,500 between last year and now. Meanwhile, Syria is fighting against two enemies: the terrorism of the Islamic State, and that applied by the Pentagon with its air strikes, which kill children, women and the elderly, while illegally maintaining more than a thousand troops in that country. Venezuela, coveted for its oil and other riches, has become the main focus of international attention, after the U.S. President and his team of hawks, alongside the miserable OAS, and certain governments of the region pledged their support for a coup plan.

The death last week of Geovanny, aged just six years old, moved the Bolivarian nation and the international community. Another 26 Venezuelan children are waiting in Europe for PDVSA’s funds to be unfrozen, after being sent there by the revolutionary government to save their lives. They now endure the uncertainty that they could end up like Geovanny.

The U.S. people, who also have children – many of whom die in school shootings or are sent to war – must be moved on hearing about cases like these, and those of many others who die because of the weapons and sanctions of their government.

(Granma)

As a health professional trained by the revolution in the teachings of Marti, Che and Fidel, I believe in altruism, humanism and internationalism, which constitute the essence of medical education in my country, applying what the Apostle will express: “Helping those in need is not only part of duty, it is part of happiness”.

Thousands of collaborators fulfill the internationalist duty in all Venezuelan geography and the difficulties don’t stop the fulfillment of our mission, having voluntariness as a principle.

As a doctor of the Parish “La Candelaria”, I work in the Promotion of Health and the Prevention of Diseases, in the vaccination, humanized childbirth, attention of the population and we carry out Health Days in the zones with a greater need of medical attention.

The peoples of Our America and the rest of the world must know that my humanist and supportive vocation, interested only in improving the health of the population we serve, regardless of political affiliation, race or religious creed, will always be there for them.

The internationalist commitment that we health professionals assume by graduating from Cuban Medical Universities will continue to be fulfilled wherever it is needed, because a doctor is only a slave to his or her humanist vocation.

The United States President Donald Trump and his cortége (Bolton, Pompeo, Rubio, Abrams) are obsessed with Venezuela. They have breakfast, tweet and talk in their unique language of aggressiveness against Caracas.

Public and secret funds are now being allocated for an imperial attack against the South American country. The U.S. State Department is requesting 500 million dollars for its interventionist activity in Venezuela next fiscal year. The Pentagon is making calculations for an eventual military assault. Meanwhile in Puerto Rico, authorities, inhabitants, the media, question where is the promised and unfulfilled aid on behalf of the United States Administration to face the unresolved effects of two powerful hurricanes, Irma and Maria, that hit in September 2017, as well as the increasing accumulated poverty rates in the so-called Island of Enchantment.

President Donald Trump complained a few days ago that his Administration, which controls Puerto Rico as a colony, allocated about $ 91 billion for its recovery. According to him, that amount exceeds the aid granted by the Federal Government to other states also affected by tornadoes. Nevertheless, Puerto Rico’s governor Ricardo Rosello refuted those statements and stated that in fact Washington had only granted $5.3 billion, specifically to restore their power supply and to replace steel and wood roofs ripped off by strong winds with tarps.

Rossello said that 18 months after Hurricane Katrina struck Louisiana in 2005 under the George W. Bush Administration had, 2,400 permanent building projects, while Puerto Rico has only 46.

Puerto Rico suffered more than 4,000 deaths during and after Hurricane Maria, an amount not recognized by the administration in Washington, and more than a year passed before its power grid was restored. People around the globe will never forget the image of Mr. Trump throwing paper towels to an audience that received him during his brief 4 hour visit to Puerto Rico.

High Child Poverty Rates

Childhood poverty has been a heavy burden for Puerto Rican society for decades. According to statistics released by the non-profit Institute for Youth Development (IDJ), it has never dropped below 50% since 1999.

The latest Well-being Index of Children and Youth, released yearly by this non-governmental organization during the last five years, shows an increase of 58 per cent in 2017, the last year with available statistics which is 2% more than in 2016.

What is worse, according to newspaper El Nuevo Dia, Puerto Rico has had more poor children than non-poor for decades but there are no governmental policies against it.

“We have never had a public policy aimed at this issue of childhood poverty. It is not incorporated into economic development plans. Sometimes we talk about the participation of the labor force, which is helpful but it’s not the same as taking into account the needs of families with children, who have very specific challenges. We do not see that either in political agendas,” says IDJ executive director Amanda Rivera.

Statistics from the United States Census Bureau show that Puerto Rico’s standard of living has continue to decline. . At the end of July 2018, 44.4% of the Puerto Rican population was in poverty.

That same information shows that poverty rates in the United States is at 12.3%.

U.S. Census Bureau Data

The famous showcase colony that the United States tried to display in the sixties and seventies as opposed to the Cuban Revolution has completely broken down.

A news article recently released by Puerto Rican Jose Calderon, President of the Hispanic Federation in the U.S., warned about the situation of living on the island; “A real national emergency continues in our nation almost a year and a half after Hurricane Maria ripped apart the homes and livelihoods of millions of Puerto Ricans, leaving tens of thousands struggling without jobs and housing, and suffering through a federal disaster-relief effort that is so poorly managed that it almost appears intentional. A year later, we continue to see heartbreaking evidence of how President Trump and his administration continue to dismiss and disregard the plight of American citizens living in Puerto Rico.”

The Puerto Rican people are second-class citizens for Trump and his Administration. They are loathed and forgotten. They are colonized and discarded.

There is not one single thought from the White House’s boss for the Boricuas in need. He is too busy drafting his next tweet or a new sanction against Venezuela.

http://www.cubadebate.cu/opinion/2019/04/23/trump-obsesionado-con-venezuela-mientras-deja-a-puerto-rico-a-la-deriva/#.XMIebNhlAb5

Source: Cubadebate, translation by Resumen Latinoamericano North America bureau

This concept, he said, was reaffirmed by young leaders from Manicaragua and Cienfuegos, who reported impressive results in their schools, emphasizing the importance of personal example and dedication.

During his comments, Diaz-Canel established a collective reflection, seasoned with remembrances of his student days and those spent in leading the Ministry of Higher Education, noting the continued relevance of foundational precepts of Cuban education, cherished by teachers and professors over the years, including Fidel Castro and José Ramón Fernández, who we all recall affectionately, as a revolutionary and pedagogue, he said.

The main task at hand, he pointed out, is the improvement of teaching, with experimental projects underway in a several institutions, the results of which will be generalized.

He noted that despite the difficult times, a new special education school was recently inaugurated in Santiago de Cuba, with another to open soon in Villa Clara, examples of what a Revolution can do.
He emphasized that the work of teachers and professors merits more recognition.

Teresa Amarelle Boué, Party Political Bureau member and secretary general of the Federation of Cuban Women, honored Ena Elsa Velázquez, Minister of Education, with the Ana Betancourt Order, for her career as an educator and government leader. Distinctions were also awarded to pedagogical schools and provincial education directorates with the best results in 2018.

The meeting was also attended by Roberto Morales Ojeda, Political Bureau member of the Party and vice president of the Councils of State and Ministers, and Olga Lidia Tapia, member of the Central Committee Secretariat, and other leaders.

First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba Raúl Castro and President Miguel Díaz-Canel yesterday attended the inauguration of the Amistad Cuba-Vietnam School for children with physical-motor disabilities in Santiago de Cuba, a dream of the historical leader of the Revolution, Fidel Castro.

Speaking on behalf of parents, Aylin Torres stated that if anyone has the idea of ​​taking away the beautiful building, in an attempt to apply Chapter III of the Helms-Burton Act, they will be obliged to face the students themselves, parents, teachers, and other workers who will defend it unconditionally.

The school is located in Villa Elvira, a residence which the illustrious patriot Emilio Bacardi Moreau (1844-1922) had built for his wife’s enjoyment on the former El Coral estate, in the neighborhood of Cuabitas, outside of the city, on Boniato Road.Perhaps the rural atmosphere with flowering mangoes and palms, surrounded by green hills, combined with the care artists took in the decoration of buildings and gardens, including a large central fountain, as well as the welcoming dormitories and game rooms, and especially the staff, make clear that there is joy here.”I think the opening of the school has been successful,” said Dr. Triana Mederos, national director of Special Education at the Ministry of Education, “because these students with physical-motor disabilities, these first 67 from the provinces of Las Tunas, Holguín, Granma, Guantánamo and Santiago de Cuba, seem to feel at home, as if they had already studied here several years.”“As you can see,” she said, “centers of this kind imply much effort and resources from the state, and although the fundamental objective is the physical, psychological, and pedagogical rehabilitation of children, they are not compulsory schools, and require the willingness and close involvement of parents.”She added that “programs and strategies are designed on the basis of the extensive experience of our teachers, precise diagnoses and attention from specialists in Public Health, the Ministry of Labor and Social Security, the Cuban Association of the Physically Limited (Aclifim), with the decisive integration of parents and families.”

The student body includes children aged five to 15, pursuing standard national primary and secondary academic programs, along with physical rehabilitation provided by multi-disciplinary teams, as well as occupational therapy, with all necessary resources available.

- Some 34,000 children, adolescents, and youth are enrolled in special schools in Cuba.- Nearly 12,000 teachers serve them.- Schooling in these institutions is not mandatory. Parents decide if they want their sons and daughters to attend a special or a regular school.- If a regular program is chosen, individualized attention is guaranteed.-

A total of 202 diagnostic and guidance centers exist across the country, at least one in every municipality, to advise families in determining the context that can best support their child’s development.- Multidisciplinary teams composed of pedagogues, educational psychologists, speech therapists, social workers, and diagnostic staff design and support educational plans.- The Ministry of Education works closely with the Ministry of Public Health to serve hospitalized children.

A quote from Fidel presided the central act to mark the end of the Cuban Medical Brigade’s participation in Brazil’s More Doctors program, held this Thursday in Havana: “No one can sabotage Cuba’s cooperation with other Third World countries. Facts and not just words. Fast action and not waiting indefinitely when there are human beings from poor countries who are dying every day at all hours.”

“You are a symbol of the country that trained you, and offer examples of the types of men and women we aspire to in Cuban society, based on justice and humanism, not on survival of the fittest,” stated the President of the Councils of State and Ministers, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, at the act to honor doctors who returned to Cuba after fulfilling their mission in Brazil.

“The return to the Homeland is not the end, it is a beginning. You arrive at an important moment for Cuba, when we are about to approve the new Constitution that will be submitted to a referendum on February 24,” the President stressed.

“You who return to your work centers or leave to fulfill other missions are part of this people that offers us acts of heroism. On behalf of the Party and the government, I would like to reiterate that we are deeply proud of each one of you, as we are of the rest of the health collaborators carrying out missions in 66 other countries,” he added.

The ceremony was held in Havana’s Central Medical Cooperation Unit. Also present were: José Ramón Machado Ventura, Second Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba Central Committee; members of the Party Political Bureau: Roberto Morales Ojeda, vice president of the Councils of State and Ministers; and Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla, Minister of Foreign Affairs; as well as Minister of Public Health José Ángel Portal Miranda.

Medical collaborator Indira García Arredondo, who returned to the island after providing her services in the state of Sao Paulo, noted on behalf of her colleagues: “The fierce campaign that we all experience, the permanent invitation to bow down, the carrot promised by false prophets of freedom and democracy, which they themselves have trampled over a thousand times. But they were wrong… Our work culminated with results that even our enemies have not been able to conceal. We transformed health indicators and improved the quality of life of millions of Brazilians.”

The ceremony recognized the organizations that supported Cuba’s participation in the More Doctors for Brazil program, and the return of Cuban doctors to the country in just 20 days: the Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Foreign Trade and Investment, Transportation, Public Health; the Central Bank of Cuba, the General Customs Office of the Republic, and the mass media.

(Granma)