[News] What Cuba Has to Teach, in Pandemic Times and Beyond

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/05/01/what-cuba-has-to-teach-in-pandemic-times-and-beyond/ 



  What Cuba Has to Teach, in Pandemic Times and Beyond

by Diana Block - May 1, 2020
------------------------------------------------------------------------

In July 2019, I visited the Cuban Institute for Genetic Engineering and 
Biotechnology <http://www.cigb.edu.cu/en/> (CIGB) as part of the 50^th 
Anniversary Venceremos Brigade <https://vb4cuba.com/>. We were impressed 
by the many scientific advances that the Institute had achieved, 
including the development of interferons to successfully fight viral 
diseases such as dengue and ebola. Little did we imagine that in another 
seven months Cuba’s unique Alpha 2-B recombinant interferon (IFNrec) 
<https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/03/17/cubas-contribution-to-combatting-covid-19/> 
would become one of the first-line anti-viral drugs used in China and in 
other countries around the world to fight the global COVID-19 pandemic.

Cuba’s development of this vital interferon is now being widely 
recognized even in mainstream U.S. publications such as Newsweek 
<https://www.newsweek.com/cuba-drug-fight-coronavirus-us-sanctions-1493872>. 
Its scientific and medical advances are breaking through the U.S. 
disinformation blockade which routinely is able to suppress or distort 
all reference to Cuban accomplishments. In a recent webinar 
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7ieph8uC2M>, the Cuban ambassador to 
the U.S. , José Ramón Cabañas and other medical experts explained that 
IFNrec is not a cure for COVID-19, but preliminary reports are 
promising, pointing to IFNrec’s efficacy (in combination with other 
drugs) in treating COVID-19. Over 45 countries around the world have 
asked Cuba for this important drug, but at this point it isn’t available 
in the U.S. U.S. and Canadian organizers have begun a campaign 
<https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/05/01/what-cuba-has-to-teach-in-pandemic-times-and-beyond/us-cubanormalization.org> 
to call for the incorporation of IFNrec into U.S. and Canadian clinical 
trials and for the U.S. FDA to approve it for use in the U.S.

U.S. media has also had to grudgingly acknowledge the impressive medical 
brigades that Cuba has sent to over 20 countries, offering medical and 
public health expertise to Italy, Haiti, Jamaica, Angola, South Africa 
and many others. Over 1200 Cuban medical personnel are directly involved 
in the fight against COVID-19 and many are part of the specially trained 
Henry Reeve International Medical Brigade which is named after an 
American 
<https://www.cubastandard.com/qa-cubas-unique-model-of-medical-internationalism/> 
who fought in the first Cuban war of independence, 1868-1878, against 
Spanish colonialism. The Henry Reeve Brigade was formed in 2005 partly 
in response Hurricane Katrina, although Cuba’s offer to send medical 
personnel to help in New Orleans was rejected by President Bush.

The U.S. government has tried to defame Cuba’s medical solidarity 
<http://www.radiorebelde.cu/english/news/cuba-us-government-earmarks-millions-to-hinder-cuban-medical-cooperation-20190829/> 
by claiming that it is done only for financial gain. Cuba’s foreign 
minister Bruno Parrilla tweeted in response to the latest allegations, 
“Unfortunately, while Covid-19 threatens humanity, the U.S. government 
is hindering the combat of the epidemic by 
<https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/cuba-foreign-minister-denounces-u-s-defamation-of-cuban-medical-collaboration-20200326-0006.html> 
attacking countries that practice solidarity and international 
cooperation instead of ending the illegal system of unilateral coercive 
measures, such as the blockade vs Cuba.” On March 31^st a plane of 
medical supplies from China, including masks, diagnostic kits and 
ventilators, was 
<https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/cuba--new-us-interference-during-special-situation-by-covid19-20200401-0002.html> 
unable to land in Cuba due to the 1996 Helms-Burton Act, 
<http://www.coha.org/helms-burton-act-resurrecting-the-iron-curtain/> a 
law which seriously escalated the provisions of the U.S. government’s 
blockade of Cuba which has been in place since 1960.

On April 16^th the Cuban Foreign Ministry issued an urgent call 
<http://en.granma.cu/cuba/2020-04-16/the-covid-19-pandemic-makes-clear-the-need-to-cooperate-despite-political-differences> 
for cooperation and solidarity among nations, summarizing Cuba’s 
response to the crisis in the context of the global political economy 
“The pandemic has emerged and spread amidst a scenario previously marked 
by overwhelming economic and social inequalities within and among 
nations.” Unless developing countries are guaranteed access to vital 
medical/pharmaceutical technologies and neoliberal coercive economic 
measures are lifted by the U.S. and other countries, there will be no 
way to “respond to the economic and social disparities that, even 
without a pandemic, kill millions of people every year, including 
children, women and elders.”

Despite the merciless U.S. blockade which keeps Cuba from importing 
medical supplies and other vital resources, Cuba is using the many 
strengths of its renowned, free public health care system to fight 
COVID-19 on the island. Cuba has the world’s highest ratio of physicians 
to population which gives it a great advantage in battling the pandemic. 
28,000 medical students 
<http://www.radiohc.cu/en/especiales/comentarios/217558-covid-19-cuba-wages-a-war-for-which-it-is-well-prepared>, 
under the supervision of a professor, are going door-to-door around the 
country, inquiring as to whether anyone has respiratory symptoms. If 
there are symptoms the person is immediately sent to a family doctor in 
the area and if warranted to a local hospital for testing. As Susana 
Hurlich, a Canadian who has lived in Cuba for thirty years, explains the 
logic behind Cuba’s fight against COVID-19 is to “educate and mobilize 
the people 
<https://www.resumen-english.org/2020/04/door-by-door-the-cuban-government-delivers-immune-boosting-medicine-to-the-people/> 
around principles of discipline, cooperation and solidarity, and keep 
them constantly informed so that they can be active and responsible 
participants in the fight against coronavirus.”

A recent article in New York City’s Indypendent 
<https://indypendent.org/2020/04/cuban-trained-doctor-helps-mobilize-pandemic-response-in-her-south-bronx-community/> 
paper, highlighted how a Cuban-trained, American doctor is putting her 
training into practice in the South Bronx community where she currently 
works. Dr. Melissa Barber studied at ELAM, 
<https://medicc.org/ns/wp-content/cache/all/ns/elam/index.html> the 
Latin American School of Medicine which provides scholarships to people 
in the U.S. who commit to using their M.D. degrees to work in 
underserved communities. Dr. Barber explains how her education in Cuba 
provided the basis for the community organizing approach that she is now 
using to fight COVID-19 in coalition with other groups. “Anyone who has 
been trained in the Cuban health 
<https://indypendent.org/2020/04/cuban-trained-doctor-helps-mobilize-pandemic-response-in-her-south-bronx-community/> 
system knows how to assess a community’s health and in emergency 
situations survey what’s going on….One of the biggest ideas that came 
from the Cuban Revolution was that everyone, as a human right, should 
have access to healthcare and should have access to education.”

But when Bernie Sanders dared to recognize Cuban accomplishments in 
literacy and health on 60 minutes 
<https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bernie-sanders-democratic-presidential-front-runner-anderson-cooper-60-minutes/> 
in February, the backlash was immediate and intense, not only from 
Republicans but from many sectors of the Democratic Party who accused 
him of praising an “authoritarian regime.” The demonization of Cuba as 
authoritarian and anti-democratic is a truism in American politics that 
no one dares challenge. This skewed characterization goes hand-in-hand 
with the stated goals of the blockade to move Cuba towards 
American-style “democratization.”

This narrative unfortunately has a pervasive influence on progressive 
perspectives far beyond the Democratic Party. Cuba’s accomplishments in 
health, education and the environment, plus their commitment to 
international solidarity may be acknowledged but they are usually carved 
out as exceptions to what are considered the endemic problems with 
Cuba’s political system. There is little examination or in-depth study 
of the Cuban model of popular democracy 
<https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/01/23/popular-democracy-in-cuba/>which 
was developed from the beginning of the revolution as an alternative to 
representative democracy. Cubans believed that representative democracy 
as developed by capitalist countries was designed to serve the needs of 
corporations, the wealthy and international capital – not the needs of 
the people. They set about to create an alternative approach that could 
better reflect the revolutionary socialist project. The Cuban model is 
continually developing and subject to ongoing examination within Cuba. 
The recent adoption of a new Cuban constitution in 2019 
<https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/02/28/cuba-adopts-a-new-socialist-constitution/> 
based on extensive popular consultation is a case in point.

Arundhati Roy recently wrote “Historically pandemics have forced humans 
to break with the past 
<https://www.ft.com/content/10d8f5e8-74eb-11ea-95fe-fcd274e920ca> and 
imagine their world anew. This one is no different. It is a portal, a 
gateway between one world and the next.” Many of us hope that the 
pandemic could present an opportunity for social transformation if we 
can collectively figure out the way forward. We want to build on the 
generative expressions of mutual aid and solidarity that are blossoming 
in direct opposition to the exploitative structures of race, class, 
gender and empire that are laid bare in all their brutality by the pandemic.

This is the moment to ground our vision of transformative change by 
learning from the experiences of Cuba. For decades, Cuba has proven its 
capacity to implement mutual aid and solidarity within their country and 
internationally. Cuba’s system is not perfect, Cubans would be the first 
to agree. And Cuba doesn’t offer a blueprint for work that needs to be 
done inside the U.S. now. But Cuba provides a history and current 
practice that we in progressive and left movements need to study 
carefully. Sixty years of sustained struggle to build a new society, 
just ninety miles away from the continental United States, can certainly 
teach us a lot.

It is also a time when we need to vigorously defend Cuba against 
escalating economic, political and social attacks by the Trump 
administration. We have a critical responsibility to fight for an end to 
the U.S. criminal blockade of Cuba, including all economic and travel 
sanctions. We need to demand that the U.S. stop undermining Cuba’s 
global medical assistance program. We should call on the FDA to expedite 
approval of Interferon Alpha 2B recombinant and include it in U.S. 
clinical trials.

On March 20^th , President Miguel Diaz-Canel described the strengths 
<http://www.radiohc.cu/en/especiales/comentarios/217558-covid-19-cuba-wages-a-war-for-which-it-is-well-prepared> 
which Cuba brings to the fight against the pandemic “We have an 
educated, informed, responsible, compassionate, and disciplined 
people….In addition to these strengths, we have the training of more 
than 60 years of a long journey of resistance in the tough wars of all 
kinds that they have imposed on us. . . . Be strong, Cuba, we will live 
and we will overcome!”

#Venceremos!

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 https://freedomarchives.org/
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