The Cuban ambassador’s statement comes at a time when the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump is tightening the blockade imposed by the United States against the Caribbean nation almost 60 years ago, and increasing the attacks against Cuban medical missions abroad.
Health professional brigades from the island, members of the International Contingent of Doctors Specialized in Situations of Disasters and Serious Epidemics, have traveled to more than 30 nations around the world to address the pandemic
However, the successes and contributions of Cuban professionals abroad and within the Antillean nation itself, where the pandemic was contained and the country is moving through phases one and two of the recovery stage, are almost completely absent from the mainstream American media.
Much of the information disseminated in the United States are focused on State Department statements accusing Cuba of alleged human trafficking in these medical missions, which are recognized by the territories where they provide services and by international organizations.
Late in April, Cabañas called an insult to the slanderous assertions about the island’s medical cooperation published by The Washington Post.
In a letter sent to the newspaper’s editorial board, which they deliberately ignored, the diplomat said that the newspaper was seeking to ‘denigrate the commendable work done and voluntarily performed throughout this time by hundreds of thousands of Cuban health professionals and technicians in various countries’.
Only recently, at the end of June, that same newspaper acknowledged that Cuba gave an efficient response to Covid-19 and in an article, which was not exempt from its usual nuances about the island, it highlighted the measures taken in Cuba to prevent and contain the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus.