Month: March 2023

With the Creation of a Regional Medication Agency, Cuba Will Capture ‘Strategic Inputs’

At this Thursday’s meeting between the drug regulatory agencies and the foreign ministries of Cuba, Colombia and Mexico, the creation of the joint body was announced. (Government of Mexico)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Madrid, 17 March 2023 — Mexico, Colombia and Cuba announced the creation of a Medication Agency of Latin America and the Caribbean (AMLAC), with which they plan to emulate the European Medication Agency (EMA). The initiative aims to “consolidate the self-sufficiency of strategic inputs in the region” and strengthen the authorization of drugs and vaccines during health emergencies through common regulatory frameworks.

The project had been proposed in January of this year by Mexico during the Summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), and although at that meeting many countries expressed their desire to join — Bolivia, Dominica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, Jamaica and the Dominican Republic — yesterday’s virtual meeting including only the Cuban, Colombian and Mexican health authorities, who announced the initiative.

The meeting was attended by directors of the National Institute of Drug and Food Surveillance (IMVIMA) of Colombia, the Center for the State Control of Medicines, Equipment and Medical Devices of Cuba (CECMED); and the Federal Commission for Protection against Health Risks (COFEPRIS) of Mexico, in addition to the foreign ministries of the three countries, according to a statement by the Mexican Secretary of Health.

The new organization, they added, also seeks to encourage and facilitate research and development of innovative projects. In this way, an attempt will be made to cover “the technological and organizational capacity gap for the development of raw materials, pharmaceuticals and health technologies to better respond to public health needs.” continue reading

In the absence of specifics, yesterday’s information points to a cooperation mechanism that would allow Cuba to have the resources that its economy — in critical condition — and the embargo complicate, and to obtain them through other countries that don’t have those impediments. In addition, regional regulation would facilitate the sale of drugs and vaccines to the Island.

In the same way as the EMA, all countries would maintain their own regulatory agency, but AMLAC would be responsible for centralizing the evaluation of medicines that, once they are are approved, could be marketed in all member countries without waiting for the approval of each and every one of the national regulators.

In addition, the approval of the World Health Organization (WHO) would not be a prerequisite for commercialization, as has happened with Cuban vaccines against COVID-19, which Havana has sold to several countries without the endorsement of the international regulator. The approval of several national regulators has allowed the Island to place its preparations, with the case of Mexico at the forefront. COFEPRIS gave the green light in December 2021 to Abdala, the Cuban vaccine, and bought at least nine million doses. However, a year later, Mexico had barely used 262,540 doses, less than 3%.

This integration process takes place at the beginning of the anti-inflation summit, also devised by Andrés Manuel López Obrador, which was planned for Friday but yesterday was confirmed for April 5. The virtual meeting was revealed by Argentine President Alberto Fernández — who is recovering from a herniated disc operation this Wednesday — on February 26 to the press, and it was planned that Brazil and Colombia — the other two large economies of the region — would unite together with Cuba to create a product exchange mechanism in order to contain inflation.

Finally, the meeting will be online and the guests are multiplying, according to López Obrador speaking this Thursday in his daily conference. In addition to those already mentioned, there will be the presidents of Bolivia, Chile and Honduras, as well as the prime ministers of Belize, Johnny Briceño, and of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Ralph Gonsalves.

Those present have the mission of “advancing the agreement,” said the Mexican, who responded that the list of countries “is going to be expanded little by little” when asked about some absentees, such as Peru.

López Obrador insisted that the objective is “to achieve good prices for the domestic markets of the countries, through the reduction of tariffs and other trade barriers,” and that the price of food plays a very important role in the second meeting. In addition, he stated that the Development Bank of Latin America (CAF) will provide “technical assistance” to the participating countries.

Christian Asinelli, corporate vice president of Strategic Programming of the entity, confirmed it on Twitter, where he said that the CAF “will continue to strengthen cooperation and financing to the countries of the region, in order to address inflation and its impacts.”

Pending more details on how they intend to coordinate the mechanism, the disparity in the economies of the member countries will be one of the main burdens, as well as debt, very different inflation rates and almost no trade exchange between the different countries.

Translated by Regina Anavy 

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Disguised as a Doctor, a Cuban Woman From Sancti Spiritus Exchanged False $100 Bills

The serial number was the same on all the false $100 bills: ME42703207A.

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, March 14, 2023 — Three people were arrested in Sancti Spíritus for selling counterfeit dollars, but the report published on Tuesday in the official press suggests that there may be more involved in the scheme.

According to Escambray, the detainees earned about 160,000 pesos [$1,000]* for each operation, using counterfeit $100 bills. The provincial newspaper also says that each victim was given between 800 and 1,500 of these dollars at the exchange rate on the informal market (between 160 and 170 pesos per dollar), and for each transaction the profit was between 128,000 pesos [$800] and 255,000 pesos [$1,594].

Four people were affected, the newspaper continues, and it asks readers for help in finding other possible victims.

The scammers, accused of the crime of counterfeiting, advertised themselves as a couple through the Revolico classified ads portal, and once the potential victim was contacted, they were sent to a fake Facebook profile. continue reading

Using Messenger and a phone number, says Escambray, served to establish “a climate of greater trust.” For transactions, the woman used to go to the homes of those who wanted to buy. “She always tried to look friendly and dressed in a sporty style; to hide her identity she wore glasses and a backpack. But the final convincing touch was that she wore a doctor’s gown to the meetings,” says the provincial newspaper, which does not specify the presumption of innocence that should apply to every accused. “She arrived on time like a Swiss watch; sometimes on a bicycle and at others in a rented car. Now in the victim’s home, she did her job so well that none of the ’customers’ stopped to look closely at the American bills they had just bought.” The serial number was the same on each one: ME42703207A.

Escambray continues the story by quoting a source in the headquarters of the Criminal Investigation Department of the Ministry of the Interior: “Once the victim was swindled, the accused returned home to safely call the supplier of the counterfeit bills. She then gave him between 20,000 and 50,000 pesos [$125-$312], depending on the amount sold, as a reward for getting away with the scam.”

*Using the rate of 160 pesos to one dollar.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Only 15 Percent of Cuban Private Enterprises Are Involved in Food Production

The services sector is confirmed as the leader among the new companies created on the Island, with 3,014 companies, 45% of the total. (EFE)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Madrid, 17 March 2023 — Cuban authorities were clear when they announced the creation of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and non-agricultural cooperatives: the priority would be food production. The reality is that, despite the indication of preferentially authorizing these companies, only 15.3% (1,029) of the 6,704 created, up to the end of January, were involved in food. They were surpassed by gastronomic premises or supermarkets, grouped as food marketers, which with 1,273 reach 19% of the total and highlight the scarce contribution of private individuals to a state sector that has collapsed.

The services sector is confirmed as the leader among the new companies created on the Island, with 3,014 companies, some 45% of the total. “Other productions” comes in last at 21%, with 1,388 new businesses.

The data come from an analysis published this Friday by the official press in which the numbers for SMEs and non-agricultural cooperatives created through January 31, 2023 are broken down. On Thursday, more were added to a list currently composed of 7,225 businesses.

Among the most enigmatic data is that of employment. The figures indicate that 179,317 jobs were created, a figure celebrated by the report, which indicates that “development will tell if they are more or less than those required by each business or project. In any case, it is relevant for bringing in family income.” continue reading

However, to know the scope of this data it would be necessary to know how many of those jobs have been deducted from self-employment, since 3,310 of these new entities are repurposed self-employed businesses. The scale, in this sense, is balanced, since there are already 2,302 newly created jobs, when initially they were a small percentage.

The most prominent data indicate that only 42 of these businesses are engaged in exports — always through a state entity. This is even more serious if you take into account that last year when there were only 1,286 SMEs, there were already 32 that did business abroad. The exponential growth of authorized enterprises is not reflected in their contribution to the foreign sector.

By province, and as expected, Havana is ahead as a center for new initiatives, of which 2,631 are private, 43 are state and 24 are private cooperatives. The western area of the Island accounts for 62% of these businesses. Granma province has 608 private, 6 state and 5 private cooperatives, and is the province that has the most, although it is a great distance from Havana. Santiago de Cuba, Holguín and Matanzas now have around 400.

“There are fewer in Artemisa and Sancti Spíritus. The concentration of SMEs and non-agricultural cooperatives is observed in the capitals,” says the report, which highlights the importance of the 1,080 local development projects — mostly located in the center of the Island — which, in its opinion, “can increase the supply of goods and services to the population; in particular, of food.

Although the authors of the text — Doctor of Science Victoria Pérez Izquierdo and a work culture research team from the Cuban Institute of Anthropology — tend to be optimistic when pointing out that the dizzying increase in “economic actors occurs despite an unfavorable economic context, which affects access to basic inputs for the development of enterprises,” their doubts are visible.

“The questions would be,” they conclude, “when will these actors generate greater availability of food in the medium term? What obstacles do they have today in the production and sale of their goods and services? What can be transformed or modified so that these actors can increase their productive results?”

Cubadebate believes that the data reveal the need for a “better articulation” of new SMEs, as well as increasing their access to the foreign exchange market, lessening bureaucracy and designing public policies for international trade, among other steps.

The optimism generated by the timid openness to the private sector through micro, small and medium-sized enterprises has been drifting among the population and the entrepreneurs, who themselves fear or are suspicious of those who manage to create a prosperous business, since their proximity to the Government is systematically perceived.

A report by Cuba Siglo 21, a center based in Miami, entitled “Entrepreneurship in Cuba suffocated by Gaesa,” describes the SME law as “false openness,” which has served to “drown” the private sector that was beginning to emerge on the Island after the reforms of Raúl Castro, to create a kind of caste that is close to the regime, to attract foreign investment and facilitate a new rapprochement with the United States.

The same organization pointed out in January that the meetings between the Governments of Cuba and Russia confirm that the transition from a “model with a nationalized economy” to the “Russian mafia market” scheme is being implemented.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Giant Anti-Government Slogan Appears on Havana Street in Broad Daylight

The actor Edel Carrero claims to have witnessed someone creating the sign a little before three in the afternoon. (Captura)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodriguez, Havana, March 14,2023 — “Down with the dictatorship, the murderous Castros.” That was the slogan someone had written in sand, in broad daylight,  near the intersection of Crespo and Trocadero streets in Central Havana. Its broad letters can be seen stretching across the roadway in a video recorded sometime before three o’clock Tuesday afternoon. The video was posted online by the actor Edel Carrero, who claims to have witnessed the incident.

“I was heading home and saw him doing it,” says Carrero.”I waited for him to finish before recording so that he wouldn’t appear in the video, so that they wouldn’t catch him.” Carrero fears that might happen anyway because, as he notes, “There were other cameras at that corner, too.”

An hour later, a local resident could be seen sweeping up the sand after throwing several buckets of water onto the street from a balcony. The man, who was going about the task indifferently, did not bother responding when an elderly passerby asked, “Who you ordered to throw water on it?”

#Cuba “Down with the dictatorship, the murderous Castros,” written in broad daylight in Havana. Police agents supervise cleanup of the sign, written in sand on the asphalt

Meanwhile, the cleanup was being monitored by two policemen, a State Security agent and two people who appeared to be local officials of some sort.

Unlike at other such incidents, local residents distanced themselves from the site, though some could be seen whispering, making critical comments and even laughing from doorways and windows. “For this, they can find water,” said one woman sarcastically to a neighbor, with whom she was discussing the area’s supply problems.

It has been more than a year since anti-government graffiti has been scrawled anywhere, and act which had become common in the aftermath of mass protests on July 11, 2021. In February 2022, a huge sign appeared, painted on the asphalt with the slogan “Patria y Vida” on Gervasio and Enrique Barnet streets in Central Havana. It was erased during a large deployment of police at the site. The incident occurred at dawn.

A few weeks earlier, an entire mob of police as well as military and civilian agents on Suzuki motorcycles, plus a criminology vehicle, were mobilized in response to a sign of considerable size that had been painted on a wall on General Serrano Street, near the corner of Via Blanca, in the Havana district of Santos Suarez. The sign read: “Down with Canel singao [motherfucker].”

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A One-Eyed Eusebio Leal Watches Over Old Havana’s Decline

The mural of Eusebio Leal, which decorates the wall of a collapsed building in Calle Teniente Rey, has deteriorated in a very short time. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodríguez, Havana, 16 March 2023 – The mural which has decorated for years the empty space left by a building collapse in Calle Teniente Rey (almost on the corner of Monserrate and next to the paladar [private restaurant] Kilómetro Cero) has deteriorated in a very short time. The portrait of the ’Historian of the City’, Eusebio Leal — with its caption “My footsteps still look after your streets, Havana my heart, because I have not left you. I will live with you forever” — was still bright and colourful barely only a year ago.

These days, a one-eyed Leal — one-eyed because of the peeling paint — appears to give passers-by a grimace of disgust.

Eusebio Leal was the grand author of the restoration of Old Havana — in large part with the help of public funds from other countries such as Spain — and he continued the work of Emilio Roig de Leuchsenring, as head of the Office of Historiography.

Under his command, that state organisation became a powerful instrument for the promotion of culture and tourism. In his charge, for example, he had the company Habaguanex, which managed some 300 tourist sites, including restaurants, shops, markets, cafes and accommodation (totalling 546 rooms). Among these, of course, was the unfortunate Hotel Saratoga, destroyed by an explosion on 6 May 2022.

All the glory ended in 2016, when the Ministry for Armed Forces put Habaguanex under the charge of the Gaviota group, which belongs to the all-powerful Grupo de Administración Empersarial (Gaesa) [Management Administration Group], at that time led by Raúl Castro’s ex son-in-law, the late Luis Alberto Rodríguez López-Calleja.

From that moment on, everything in the historic centre of the capital went into decline — a district where many inhabitants have felt themselves orphaned by the death, on 31 July 2020, of the historian who delivered to them, and on time, a number of benefits, such as improved primary school meals.

Translated by Ricardo Recluso

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The Havana Law: The Authentic Face of the Cuban Tourist Paradise

It is important that a book like this is published in Europe, where some newspapers are still promoting the Island as a paradise of communist nostalgia. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Xavier Carbonell, Salamanca, 15 March 2023 – In the film The Lives of Others, the writer Georg Dreyman encapsulates his break with the regime in a report about suicides in communist countries. He writes it in red ink on a secret typewriter and under the vigilance of secret agent Wiesler, alias HGW XX/7. When I had just finished reading The Secret Island, by Abraham Jiménez Enoa (born in Havana in 1988), it seemed to me to be the reverse kind of book — almost tropical, although no less dramatic or oppressive.

The book doesn’t hide its scars. It talks of a nervous people, hungry, people who want to escape or kill themselves. Every page was written as the polar opposite of the official tourist guide to Cuba. It is important that a book like this is published in Europe, where some newspapers are still promoting the Island as a paradise of communist nostalgia, with cheap hotels, cigars and mulatas.

Jiménez Enoa goes further even, than just describing the “real and the incredible” poverty of Havana, ‘invention of foreign correspondents’. His interviewees, who come from a wide variety of provinces and dangerous neighbourhoods, live for la bolita — a lottery-type betting game prohibited by Castro — and they cure their illnesses using only water; they have two religions (“yoruba culture and football [soccer]”); they build portable houses out of cardboard and go out chasing French or Italian women, “the uglier and fatter the better, because those are the ones who need affection the most”. continue reading

Up until half way through the book the stories are pretty harmless. He goes out in search of the unusual but stops short of crossing the line into risky political areas. This is the natural condition of the independent journalists in Cuba — they are the marginalised, stuck in their tribe. But from this point on, things begin to change in the book, the voices move forward, and the language — earlier, varied and ambiguous — becomes a machete blow. Whereas before he used the word ’government’, now it becomes ’dictatorship’; where before he spoke of anonymous swindlers, later he alludes to the imprisoned artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara or to the dissident Ariel Ruiz Urquiola. He directly questions the president and the generals, describes his “walks” around Villa Marista, the general headquarters of the State Security secret police. Now he has nothing more to lose.

Jiménez Enoa’s works have a strange predilection for the law. With some well calculated pauses between paragraphs he points out which article of the Penal Code his interviewee is violating, and how to use this fact to challenge the police. He has read between the lines of the constitution, of Castro’s speeches, and even of the threats made by the torturers. Everything has a legislative or authoritative value, everything practiced in Cuba is criminal and if there’s a cover-up it is there once again in the language: to resolve, means to steal.

Money is another obsession in the book. How does one manage to eat or to live in a country where wages are not enough to cover the basics. A gigolo gives him the key: in real life “there are no tariffs, only cushy jobs”. He fights against everyone and against history like those people who built their ramshackle huts on the edge of Che Guevara’s mortuary square in Santa Clara, visited by tourists and government leaders. It’s the tension between the desire to live and the ghost of Castro and his guerillas. But if you can’t escape from the country, there’s always a metaphysical escape: suicide.

Whilst reading The Secret Island, another force becomes apparent, one which doesn’t often show its face and which couldn’t be more decisive: the battalion of spies, confidantes, patrol cars, informers and sympathisers of the regime. One can fight against them up to a certain point but their skill lies in their persistence and in their talent for destroying lives. In a final self-portrait, Jiménez Enoa offers up the creed of an escapologist from time and space: “Escaping from Cuba is not the same thing as escaping from any other country for the first time. To escape from Cuba is to fall into the world, to realize that Cuba is an island that has been hijacked by a political system which ensures that the country remains locked inside the twentieth century”.

I suppose that Jiménez Enoa will ask himself the same question as all of the other artists and intellectuals who have become exiled from Cuba in recent months: After his book-exorcism, his testament-report, his page-frontier, what next? Hopefully not too many years will pass before he’ll be able to dedicate a ’Sonata for a good man’ to those who watched over him, like the one that Dreyman wrote for HGW XX/7.

Exile, as the only way out

As a result of his publication, Jiménez Enoa was arrested, interrogated, tortured, and finally regulado [regulated], a method used by the Castristas by which a citizen is prevented from leaving the country freely. After he did finally escape however, and was living in a place as peaceful as Amsterdam, one of the regime’s agents actually turned up at one of his conferences and aggressively shouted out at him like a maniac that everything he was saying was a lie.

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Publisher’s note: This article was first published by the Spanish daily El Mundo, in their cultural magazine La Lectura.

Translated by Ricardo Recluso

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COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.

Discontent Among Miami Cubans Over the Outrageous Prices of Tickets to the Baseball Classic

Cuba’s team upon arrival in Miami, where it will face the United States or Venezuela. (Jit)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 16 March 2023 — Cuba’s baseball players have already arrived in Miami. Since the 4-3 victory over Australia, everything has been “joyful.” The “dancing”  spread to the clubhouse, said manager Armando Mandy Johnson. On the charter flight from Japan to Miami, the “shouting” never stopped.

The team will play at the headquarters that the Díaz-Canel Government has tried to avoid since the birth of the World Baseball Classic, according to Diario Libre journalist Nathanael Pérez Neró. “To the point that he asked to play the first rounds in Asia.”

On the streets, there is indignation about the cost of tickets. Tickets are sold at up to $1,229, and the cheapest price is $289, very high for a Cuban who earns on average between $500 and $700 a week.

Some workers of Cuban origin wanted to see the Cuban baseball team but “were appalled at the prices of the seats,” says José, an Island national who emigrated in search of better living conditions for his family and now works in a restaurant. “None of us had any intention of protesting or anything like that.”

José mentioned that “the restaurant managers were upset” with the Cuban team in Miami. The main topic of discussion was the demonstrations against Team Asere, the team reinforced with Major League players, which represents the Regime.

The Cuban team is in Miami, where thousands of Cubans emigrated after continue reading

Fidel Castro’s revolution in 1959. The largest group of exiles opposed to the Regime is also concentrated in this city and it is where, according to the 2019 American Community Survey, 999,602 inhabitants are of Cuban origin, which represents 36.2% of the total of 2,761,581 people.

“At least it will be an interesting spectacle to see Cuba, because a team from the Island has never played a tournament of such magnitude,” wrote Jorge Ebro, a journalist from Matanzas with El Nuevo Herald. “Some insist that this group has nothing to do with politics.”

A constant concern for the Regime has been the desertions of athletes; however, even if there were some in this group of players, they would be few. Several of these baseball players do not have ties with the Cuban National Institute of Sport, Physical Education and Recreation (INDER) because they are independent players. In addition, those who play in the Japanese league, such as Liván Moinelo, Yariel Rodríguez, Raidel Martínez, Yurisbel Gracial, Ariel Martínez and Alfredo Despaigne, must have the permission of their clubs in order to be hired by a Major League team.

Another of the fears is the controversy that has occurred on social networks, which has called for a demonstration against the national baseball team.

Cuba’s next game will be on Sunday at LoanDepot Park, home of the Marlins, located in Little Havana. The team will have to deal with an environment of protests.

As if the sports panorama were not already controversial, Cuban president Miguel Díaz-Canel finished politicizing it on his social networks. “March 15, such a special day. Cuba had to win,” he posted on his Twitter account after the triumph over Australia.

Díaz-Canel counted on the participation of Lis Cuesta, his wife, who posted an image on Twitter with the caption: “Babalaos get going!!! Water and eggshells on the ground.” [An appeal to the priests of Santería and an offering for positive energy]

This politicization led former spy Gerardo Hernández to quote José Martí when referring to Team Asere: “Patriotism purifies and exalts men.”

The team of coaches took a day off on Thursday. According to the official media Jit, “They will spend the day completing their analyses in relation to the game between the United States and Venezuela on Sunday. The winner will face Cuba in the next round.”

The preparation game prior to the semifinal was ruled out, and in the next few hours the starter will be made official for Team Asere, the first chance for Cuba since 2006, when it celebrated a run-up in the first edition of these battles.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.

The Government of Santiago de Cuba Says It Has No Resources To Combat the Bedbug Epidemic

Some social media users sell insecticides to fight bedbugs. (Lázaro Javier Flores)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 16 March 2023 — Families in Santiago de Cuba must resort to home methods to fight bedbugs due to the lack of chemical insecticides to eliminate them, said biologist Mirtha Pérez Menzies in an interview with Sierra Maestra. Until now, the Government had remained silent about the proliferation of the plague in the province, which in recent weeks has invaded schools, hospitals and prisons.

According to the expert, who has studied the plague in the most infested areas, five years ago it was “rare” to receive reports of the presence of bedbugs in the province, but from 2016 the infestation began to grow and has recently caused the temporary closure of schools for fumigation.

Pérez Menzies believes that the proliferation of the pest is associated “with an increase in trips abroad” and the import of packages with clothes, backpacks or shoes, places where insects easily hide. The biologist pointed out that, according to an epidemiological survey, many of the affected families had imported packages that remained for days in airport warehouses, although she admitted that when visiting homes rented by international travelers they did not find the presence of the insect. continue reading

It was also found that some families had bought a handmade mattress and the filling was contaminated. “Sometimes, unscrupulous people make them with rags and other fabrics from the garbage dumps,” the biologist said.

Santiago de Cuba has been one of the provinces with the most health alerts in recent years. In the midst of the increase in COVID-19 infections in 2021, it faced an outbreak of scabies and another of lice, while in 2022 it registered record numbers of dengue fever cases. The authorities recognize that they do not have enough resources to deal with the diseases, so they spread quickly.

To eliminate bedbugs, the health units recommend that families place footwear, sheets, towels, curtains and any other product made of fabric in a nylon bag. Leave it closed for a while, according to the authorities, and the insects will be asphyxiated and die. Families should also remove cardboard boxes or any item that facilitates a hiding place.

Since high temperatures kill the insect, one option is to pour hot water with soap on the bed, mattresses, sofas and walls, which are then left to dry in the sun. Another alternative is to apply petroleum jelly on the legs of furniture to make it difficult for them to climb, and alcohol or any insecticide, but the biologist does not recommend using these products since the insects are resistant and adapt to chemical substances.

The expert in medical entomology explained that bedbugs reproduce in both clean and dirty places, because what they really need to survive is a host and hiding places. She recognized that they proliferate more easily in spaces with dirt.

This insect is also known as a bedbug in reference to its preferred habitat. They usually feed at night, attracted by the heat of the human body and animals. Pérez Menzies explained that its saliva has an anesthetic effect, so people do not feel discomfort when they are bitten.

Once they reach their habitat, the specialist added, they can go for a year and a half without feeding. In addition, they lay five to 10 eggs a day, 500 in their entire life.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.

Mexico Doubles the Hiring of Cuban Doctors With 600 More

Meeting of Cuban doctors in the Mexican state of Guerrero. (Facebook/Salud Guerrero)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 14 March 2023 — Mexico extended its health agreement with Cuba and will hire another 600 specialists from the Island. As announced on Tuesday by the director of the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS), Zoé Robledo, the agreement was finalized with the Cuban Medical Services Marketer, responsible for selecting the health group and defining the salary issue.

Their hiring is part of the Health Plan for Wellbeing implemented by the Mexican Government in 2022, which aims to provide medical services to those who do not have social security. As part of this strategy, workspaces were also created for 27,398 retired doctors to work with IMSS.

Xavier Tello, a consultant and graduate of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, reacted to this announcement on his social networks: “Wouldn’t it be easier to simply offer more decent salaries (90,000 net pesos/month), with permanent contracts and an excellent benefits package?” he asked, referring to active Mexican doctors.

Last February, Tello warned the EFE agency about the hiring of doctors from the Island, which represented, in his opinion, “a terrible forecast of where we want to take health policies. (Cuban doctors) are taking away the possibility of having a decent job from Mexicans and are not solving the basic problem, which is raising the level of Mexican medicine.” continue reading

The health specialist described this arrival of Cuban doctors as a “patch” to fill the places that Mexicans, due to low salaries and transfers to unsafe areas, will not cover. “What [the Government of Mexico] has to do is inject resources. Mexicans should have higher pay and a better job offer. And what López Obrador wants to do is continue paying little and stigmatize Mexican doctors  because they don’t want to accept poorly paid jobs.”

Zoé Robledo also mentioned that “another 188 Cuban health workers who were recruited in the national calls” will begin to provide services in the month of April, without specifying the states to which they will be sent. With this, Mexico expects to have 1,429 specialists, who have been hired under the argument of providing care in areas far from Mexico City.

Last October, the Government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador launched a call to cover another 749 spaces with foreign specialists, in which health workers from the Island were also registered. According to what was specified, the selected doctors would be paid $2,600 a month.

Without becoming official, this amount would be the what the Cuban government would pocket for each of the 188 specialists on the Island, who in reality, as various organizations have denounced, will receive only a small percentage.

According to data provided by the federal official, so far 610 Cuban specialists are working in 12 Mexican states. The agreement points out that these doctors would offer consultation in remote areas, such as the Montaña de Guerrero, one of the most dangerous regions in Mexico due to the presence of organized crime groups.

For each of the 641 specialists sent in the first group from Cuba, Mexico pays the Government of the Island 2,042 dollars per month, while the payment for each general practitioner is 1,722. In practice, Cuban physicians are only granted a small stipend during the year in which they work.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.

Cuba Is the Sixth Country With the Most Spaniards Living Abroad

After Argentina, Cuba is the country with the most Spaniards residing outside Latin America. (14ymedio)

14ymedio biggerEFE (via 14ymedio), Madrid, March 16, 2023 — The number of people with Spanish nationality residing abroad reached 2,790,317 as of January 1, 2023, which represents an increase in one year of 47,712 people, 1.7%, according to data published this Thursday by the National Institute of Statistics (INE). Cuba is the sixth country with the most Spaniards: 160,833.

The foreign country where the most Spaniards live is still Argentina (477,465), followed by France (297,142), the United States (192,766), Germany (182,631), the United Kingdom (which despite Brexit has continued to rise, 2.9% in 2022, to 181,181), Mexico (155,543), Brazil (136.611), Venezuela (the only one of the first 10 that has decreased, by 2.8%, to 136,145) and Switzerland (132,384).

In addition to Venezuela, the Spanish population has decreased in Peru (–1.6%), Morocco (–0.9%), Chile (–0.7%), Argentina (–0.6%), Uruguay and Ecuador (–0.1 % in both cases). continue reading

The Census of Spanish Residents Abroad also reveals that of the total, 166,728 were new registrations in 2022, and that 43,593, or 26.1% of these were born in Spain; 98,428, 59.0%, in the country of residence; and 24,797, 14.9%, in other countries.

Almost nine out of 10 of the 43,593 new foreign residents born in Spain registered in European or American countries: 26,430, 60.8%, in European countries and 12,347, 28.4%, in the Americas.

Returning to the entire population of Spanish nationality residing abroad, 1,407,081 are women and 1,383,236 men.

In addition, 1,753,155, 62.8%, are between 16 and 64 years old; 616,798, 22.1%, are 65 or older; and 420,364, 15.1%, are under 16 years old.

Some 58.7% have fixed their residence in America, 37.7% in Europe and 3.6% in the rest of the world, although the largest increases in registrations during 2022 occurred on the European continent, with 32,589 more, ahead of the American, with 19,698 more.

According to this INE statistic, 844,660, 30.2% of the total of almost 2.8 million were born in Spain; 1,626,079, 58.3%, in the country of residence; and 314,532, 11.3%, in other countries (in 0.2% of cases that information is not recorded).

That proportion is similar in the case of those who live in Africa but changes for the rest of the continents: in Europe, Asia and Oceania, because there are more people born in Spain, and in America, because there are more born in the country of residence.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.

The US Senate Wishes To ‘Accelerate the Investigation Into the Murder’ of Oswaldo Paya

The state in which the car was left in which Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero lost their lives more than ten years ago.

14ymedio bigger EFE (via 14ymedio), Miami, 7 March 2023 — A group of bipartisan senators, led by Democrat Dick Durbin, sent a letter to Tania Reneaum Panszi, executive secretary of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), to “accelerate the progress of the investigation into the murder” of Cuban opponents Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero.

The group includes Senators Marco Rubio (Republican, Florida), Tim Kaine (Democrat, Virginia), Bill Cassidy (Republican, Louisiana), Bob Menéndez (Democrat, New Jersey), Ted Cruz (Republican, Texas), Ben Cardin (Democrat, Maryland) and Mark Warner (Democrat, Virginia).

“We are writing to you to request an update of the investigation into the suspicious and tragic death of Cuban political reformer Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas in 2012. In the more than 10 years since his car fatally left a Cuban road, little or nothing has been done to punish those responsible,” begins the letter dated this Monday, March 6.

Payá’s family denounced from the first moment that it was an attack in which another vehicle intervened and, in 2013, along with Cepero’s family, filed the complaint with the IACHR, which has taken nine years to convene the first public hearing, although it has had the information of the case for a long time. continue reading

“We continue to believe,” the letter adds, “that, even without the cooperation of the Cuban Government, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights is the most appropriate body to carry out this necessary investigation and accountability. We are concerned about the persistent delays in this effort.”

On December 13, 2021, in an interview with EFE on the eve of the first hearing of “case 9,416” before the IACHR, Rosa María Payá, daughter of the Cuban opponent Oswaldo Payá, stressed that an acknowledgment — and condemnation — by the organization of the responsibility of the Cuban State in the crash in which her father and Harold Cepero lost their lives in 2012 would be “very important” for the families.

“Payá’s work, the sustained threats against him and the key circumstances of the day he died are well documented,” the senators say in their letter.

“The Commission has shown from previous investigations, such as the 2019 High-Level Commission on Nicaragua, that it can carry out its critical work even if the State in question does not cooperate,” the letter reads.

It also adds that “investigations such as that of Payá’s death bring to light not only human rights problems of the past, but also help deter new acts of repression,” the senators wrote in the official communication from the office of Senator Durbin, a democrat for the state of Illinois.

According to the American politicians, “the Payá family and the lawyers of the R.F. Kennedy Center filed the lawsuit with the IACHR more than 9 years ago and have been updating the Commission with all the evidence discovered during this time.”

According to a statement from Senator Durbin’s office, “in 2002 Payá initiated the Varela Project that sought greater political freedom in Cuba through a campaign of peaceful petition and a referendum process, as allowed by the Cuban Constitution.”

“The Cuban government not only rejected the historical effort and blatantly changed the constitutional provision that allowed such a public method for change, but also began a decade of shameful harassment of Payá and his movement,” the statement emphasizes.

“The members of the Organization of American States and the international community expect protection, accountability and justice from the Commission. Therefore, provide us with a timely update on the ongoing and future efforts in the Payá case,” the senators asked Reneaum Panszi.

For the crash in which Payá and Cepero lost their lives, the driver of the vehicle, the Spanish conservative politician Ángel Carromero, was convicted in Cuba and sentenced to four years in prison in Cuba for reckless driving resulting in death. Most of his sentence was served in Spain after the governments of both countries agreed to his return.

Carromero was driving the car without a valid permit in Spain, since he had run out of points after accumulating 42 traffic violations, as revealed by the newspaper El Mundo.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.

Team Asere Does Not Belong to the Dictatorship, It Belongs to the Cuban People

Yariel Rodriguez during this Wednesday’s game with Australia, in which Cuba managed to qualify for the quarterfinals in the World Classic. (EFE)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Rolando Gallardo, Quito, 16 March 2023 — I once heard an influencer, whose name I don’t want to remember, say that the “Cuban opposition was facing a scientific regime using improvisation.” This idea may have arisen creatively and spontaneously or come from the argument of Gene Sharp [an American political scientist]: “The idea that improvisation will give you great success is absurd; it’s exactly the opposite. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you’ll most likely get into serious trouble.”

This is the story of the Cuban opposition’s wild goose chase, always unscientific, far from the clear minds that make it up. There is so little of our awareness of real power that we end up acting without the nobility of victors. This visceral and predictable form of the brothers in opposition to the dictatorship is our Achilles’ heel, because the Regime, scientific, methodical and equipped with propaganda resources, comes, punctures us and already knows what leg we are going to limp on.

The ball is round and comes in a square box, and so is the world, full of supposed contradictions and logical solutions. But if you don’t stop to observe with Buddhist discipline the real problems that happen in front of your nose, they will continue to fuck you ad infinitum. You may not see it yet, but the decrepit Regime and Díaz-Canel passed you a cat for a hare.

The Cuban government is in a clear crisis of prestige, with its symbols and slogans crumbling. The opposition, by chance or persistence, has managed to impose new stories, raised new flags and imprinted new slogans and goals on the Cuban mentality. For the Regime, seeing its ideological edifice built with Soviet cement fall must not be a good sign. They may be singaos [motherfuckers], but they are not fools. So they have given themselves the task of fabricating new victories and feeling renewed pride, flavored with the Cuban Communist Party (PCC). continue reading

The World Classic was the best place to have this little cultural battle. They send the Asere Team with the “mission” of bringing victory to Cuba, “the victim of the blockade,” to the “oppressed people” who made an unforgivable socialist revolution just 90 miles from the largest empire… Well, you know how the propaganda goes. They do it, in addition, knowing how we will act in the face of such a provocation. We will take improvisation out of our pockets and begin to form campaigns without sustenance or empathetic content, to boycott underpaid players who, as history has shown, take advantage of these contests to negotiate the contract-signing of their lives that will take them forever out of that hell in which they live.

Without the slightest attachment to the bases of propaganda, without understanding that marketing, whether commercial or political, seeks to empathize, attract, fall in love with and engage the receiver, we lend ourselves to the Cuban Communist Party’s game. Divide and win, they poisoned the team with Díaz-Canel’s outstretched hand and made the great debate begin of whether or not it was ethical to bite the hand of the “communist stepmother.”

We accept the facts that the official narrative presents to us. We don’t try for a moment an elastic withdrawal and counterattack strategy. We entrench ourselves in the predictable discourse and begin to act on impulse. We start the smear campaigns of a ball team, of people who suffer from inflation like anyone else, who have cousins or acquaintances imprisoned for the demonstrations on July 11, 2021 [11J], Cubans like many others, closer to us than to them, and we made them the embodiment of evil.

Yulieski Gurriel receiving an award from Fidel Castro in 2006. (Granma)

In this propaganda distraction we were not creative. I think it might be better to give them support, to rob from them the idea that the team is the property of the dictatorship. We could forgive them for any statement. In the end, thousands of Cubans have had to support the Regime circumstantially, while they prepare their getaway. It would be more stoic to reaffirm that sport belongs to the Cuban people and that no sectarian party could abolish that. Aren’t there photos of Yulieski Gurriel receiving awards from Fidel Castro? Isn’t the Gurriel family now a symbol of free and prosperous Cubans in the United States? Aren’t thousands of Cubans going to applaud him and take pictures with him?

We have time to receive Team Asere in style in Miami, the land of free Cubans, the home of the Cuban family. The Cuban team that presents itself in South Florida is always a Home Club. If we were an intelligent opposition, we would fill the stadium with the flags of Cuba, of the United States, with Patria y Vida [Homeland and Life] posters. We would bring shouts of victory and support, so that they feel at home. It is very likely that they will move here soon. I would like to see how the fuck they are going to broadcast on Cuban television a stadium full of happy Cubans, anti-communists and baseball players to the core, supporting the Cuban team and shouting “freedom”! That’s what it’s all about, that’s how you play with science.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.

Cuba Moves to the Semifinal in Miami After Defeating Australia in the World Baseball Classic

The Cuban team will travel to Miami for the semifinal round. (Jit)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Miami, 15 March 2023 — The Cuban baseball team qualified for the semifinal round of the World Classic after beating Australia 4-3 in this Thursday’s game. The so-called Team Asere was among the four best teams of the tournament for the first time in 17 years, despite the absence of two of its star players, Yoenis Céspedes and Andy Ibáñez.

The monumental Tokyo Dome stadium in Japan was the stage in which the team, led by Armando Johnson, achieved success after an uncertain start. Australia put a number on the board in the second inning thanks to Darryl George, who managed to reach second base without being put out, and Aaron Whitefield connected with a sacrifice hit so that his teammate could advance, all this in the face of the pitching by Cuban Yariel Rodríguez.

Team Asere’s reaction came in the third inning. Against Australian relief player Mitch Neunborn, Moncada reached second base from left field, and Luis Robert tied the game.

The Cuban counterattack occurred in the lower part of the fifth inning with three runs. Santos started with a hit and managed to get Moncada and Robert to fill the bases. Alfredo Despaigne connected with a deep high and prompted the run of advantage. Then came two singles in a row from Erisbel Arruebarrena and Yoelkis Guibert, who managed to raise the score to 4-1, in favor of Team Asere.

continue reading

When everything suggested that the triumph was more than certain, a technical decision made Cuba tremble. Armando Johnson took out Miguel Romero to replace him with the left-hander Roenis Elías. A hesitation of the Cuban in the upper part of the sixth inning allowed Rixon Wingrove to hit a home run, and two runs brought Australia closer.

“Cuba’s leadership improvised in the sixth, and it cost them two runs,” journalist Francys Romero wrote on his social networks. “The replacement of Luis Miguel Romero (35 pitches), the best Cuban pitcher of the tournament, was illogical. Romero had to deliver in the seventh to Moinelo and then to Martínez in the end.”

Roenis Elías adjusted and was able to get out of the sixth and seventh innings without much difficulty, while Livan Moinelo went out to the mound for the eighth inning  and, together with Raidel Martinez who closed the game, they were in charge of extinguishing the Australian push.

The next game for the Cuban team will be in Miami on March 19 at 7:00 p.m. at LoanDepot Park, home of the Marlins. The rival has yet to be defined.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.

The Welcome.US Website That Offers Sponsors to Cuban Migrants Collapses

So far, according to State Department figures, about 10,000 Cubans have used the humanitarian “parole” program. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Madrid, March 15, 2023 — The website of the NGO Welcome.US collapsed on Wednesday, minutes before opening the March application quota to benefit from the immigration program designed by Washington to legally enter the United States through a sponsor.

“The Welcome Connect platform has technical difficulties. We are working to fix this, and we will be online soon,” the page said from about 10:00 in the morning (Cuba time), an hour before the quota opened, which starts every 15th of the month.

The organization, founded in 2021 to support applications for Afghan refugees, expanded its work in 2022 for Ukrainians and, since last February, it also works for Cubans, Venezuelans, Nicaraguans and Haitians. In addition, it is endorsed by four former presidents and first ladies of the United States: Barack and Michelle Obama, George and Laura Bush, Bill and Hillary Clinton, and Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter.

Welcome.US connects potential sponsors in the United States with potential beneficiaries of the program who don’t know anyone who can vouch for them in the country. The sponsors have the support of the Government, which verifies the identity and background of the applicants. continue reading

“Our ultimate ambition is that each American community, and the nation as a whole, has the resources and willingness to receive newcomers, now and in the future,” says the website.

However, the organization, which defines itself as non-governmental and apolitical, affirms that its modest dimensions only allow it to accept a limited number of requests that they are able to handle.

The avalanche of users who wanted to connect today has knocked down the page. Among the hundreds of people who have reacted to the situation, some complained that there are those who try to sign on simultaneously for the program. Others pointed out that the concentration of applicants from four nationalities in the same day contributes to the collapse.

Last month, when the program began to operate, a multitude of Cubans were left unable to access due to the restrictions of the embargo, which prevent entry into some American pages. On this occasion, most followed the instructions to connect with VPN.

The eagerness of Cubans to find a sponsor was immediate after the launch of the humanitarian parole by the United States was announced at the beginning of this year. The permit, also aimed at Venezuelans, Nicaraguans and Haitians, opens the door for up to 30,000 migrants a month to enter legally if they have a resident in U.S. territory who will support them economically and cover their health expenses for two years.

So far, according to State Department figures, about 10,000 Cubans have used the program.

Translated by Regina Anavy
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COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.

Betania Is Offering Readers Thirty-Seven Cuban Books as Free Downloads

The volumes are available in PDF format, and were issued by the publisher between 2011 and 2023.  (Editorial Betania)

14ymedio bigger 14ymedio, Havana, March 15, 2023 — The Madrid-based Betania publishing house has issued a catalog containing a collection of thirty-seven Cuban-themed e-books that can be downloaded for free from its website. The volumes are available in PDF format and were released by the publisher between 2011 and 2023.

As stated in its introduction, Betania began offering free downloads of several of books on their blog in 2011. Among the titles were Conversations with Gastón Baquero by Felipe Lázaro (its first published title), the poetry collection Language of Mutes by Delfín Prats, the short story collection Nostalgia, Irony and Other Nallucinations, by Amir Valle, and the memoir Today like Yesterday by Antonio Guedes.

It offers books by Cuban authors still living on the island as well as those in exile, and by writers in the broader Hispano-American world.

Betania was founded in Madrid in 1987 by the Cuban exile poet Felipe Lázaro. It describes itself as “a publishing house in the service of Hispano-American culture.” It offers books by Cuban authors still living on the island as well as those in exile, and by writers in the broader Hispano-American world.

It has also maintained a “clear poetic mission” largely by publishing books of poetry by important Spanish-language writers such as the Peru’s Alfredo Pérez Alencart. It has also published plays, essay collections, fiction, and interviews. Betania’s titles are distributed in fourteen collections.

Other notable Betania authors include Dulce Maria Loynaz, Reinaldo Arenas, Jose Mario, Ángel Escobar, Raul Rivero, Virgilio Lopez Lemus, Daína Chaviano, Matías Montes Huidobro, Jorge Luis Arcos and Aimee Gonzalez Bolaños.

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COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.