Cuban Medical Cooperation Results in The Third World

Belize
Due to the presence of the Cuban medical brigade, 45 Health Centers, 37 of them located in rural areas, were able to start functioning. Family health care services, covering 100,000 people, were included in the program for rural areas.

Guatemala
During its 18 months of work, the Cuban medical cooperation in Guatemala has implemented, along with the Health Ministry of that country, a net of primary health care in each of the departments where it is present. Through this net, the application of a Mother-Child health care program by virtue of which the infant mortality rate was reduced from 40x1000 born alive to 18.5x1000 born alive have been possible.

Along with the Guatemalan Health Ministry, Cubans are working in the implementation of an educational program addressed to foster family medicine in 6 departments of the country.

Haiti
With financial support of Japan and the PHO, a vaccination campaign for protection against six childhood illnesses, which will cover an infant population of 800 thousand children, is carried out in Haiti. Cuban health personnel resulted a decisive force in that campaign.

A project of triangular cooperation among Cuba, France and Haiti is developed in two departments of the South. A French contribution amounting 400 000 USD will be devoted to purchase medicines and medical inputs as well as to train human resources. That project is led by Cuban health professionals.

Honduras
Cuban cooperation has achieved 12% of medical care covering, but in departments like Intibuca and the Mosquitia , the most remote in the Honduran geography, and with a more difficult economic situation, a covering of 85% of the population has been reached.

In the Honduran Mosquitia, department located in the northwest of the country, infant mortality reduction has been up to 40%. According to the Honduran Health Ministry official information, the rate of infant mortality in that department was 92 for each 1000 born alive in 1998. Through Cuban medical cooperation, the first semester of the 2000 close with a mortality rate of 46 per 1000 born alive. That is to say, in a year and a half of cooperation, 54 children’s lives were saved in that department.

In Santa Bárbara department with a population of 300 000 inhabitants, the mortality rate was 60 per 1000 born alive at the arrival of the Cuban medical cooperation. This rate was reduced to 45 per 1000 born alive in just six months.

At the request of the First Lady of Honduras and of the leaders of the tawahka ethnic group, which is considered by UNESCO an anthropological reserve of that region, in serious danger of extinction as a result of their population's abrupt reduction, the Government of Cuba has begun a comprehensive health care program in these communities with the purpose of protecting their population and developing the region.

The Cuban medical cooperation has proven its integrality with the presence of electro-medical engineers who have repaired a significant number of medical equipments, allowing the Honduran Health Ministry to save a total of 371 266 USD.

On request of the Honduran Government, faced to a difficult situation provoked by the dengue epidemic, Cuban medical brigade has been reinforced with 20 new specialists plus 12 water heater nebulizators and ½ ton of pesticides. The joint work they are developing with the country health authorities is aimed at neutralizing the epidemic which has already taken the lives of 4 Hondurans, 3 of them children.

Cuba has also sent a SUMA equipment with 5 000 diagnosis tests that have facilitated both the active searching of cases and the precocious detection of the illness.

Venezuela
107 members of a medical team remain working in Venezuela, 99 of them located in the State of Vargas and 8 in Miranda .Seventy one are doctors, 14 graduated in nursery and 22 are paramedic professionals and technicians.

Cuban Comprehensive Health Care Delivery Program covers a population of 225 549 out of the 304 000 inhabitants of the State of Vargas who represent the 74.19% of the total population of the state. Our medical team is distributed in 4 regions: Carayaca, Catia the Sea, Caraballeda and Caruao.

The Cuban doctors are located in 45 of the 57 health posts of the State of Vargas. From the primary care, they have been able to attend 456 539 people both in outpatient consultations and at home, to deliver 241 childbirths as well as to practice 2396 surgical interventions, as well as 52 615 sessions of health education and 12 806 sanitary actions.

In the regions and medical posts where our collaborators are located, the infant mortality remains in zero.

Gambia
Sentry Centers in charge of evaluating the Cuban Comprehensive Health Care Delivery Program, have recognized a 34% reduction of the infant mortality rate, that is to say, from an infant mortality rate of 121 x 1000 born alive in 1998, they have gotten to reduce the rate to 90 x 1000 born alive. With a Cuban medical team of 154 members, a population health covering of 90% has been accomplished.

The creation of a small medicine faculty in Gambia has allowed to begin the training of 22 youths in such specialty, an effort made possible with the support both of the country’s authorities and the World Health Organization, which made a contribution of USD 35 thousand for the purchasing of text books and computers.

Equatorial Guinea
In that African country with an infant mortality rate of 111 for each 1000 born alive, a health care covering of 80% of the population has been achieved with 139 Cuban medical specialists distributed in the whole country.

A work is being done by a Cuban professors staff to establish the Medicine School in which 30 young Guineans will be registered the next academic year.

In the regions and health post where our collaborators are located the infant mortality remains in zero.