Her mother, Milagros Ortiz, hopes to legalize her status so she can bring the other daughter she left in Cuba.
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Madrid, 20 October 2025 — Amanda Lemus Ortiz looks like a very different girl from the one who left Cuba almost two years ago, accompanied by her parents, Emmanuel and Milagros. Those sad, yellow eyes are now full of life in Spain. Her skin has regained its radiance and cinnamon color.
In a small apartment in Madrid, surrounded by toys her daughter has accumulated during long hospital stays, Milagros Ortiz recounts her journey to save Amanda’s life , undergoing a liver transplant at La Paz Hospital, something she couldn’t receive in Havana. “Now, thank God, Amanda has been accepted into school and will begin her adaptation process on Tuesday,” her mother boasts.
“The only fear I had was that she would die in my arms without having done anything,” she tells 14ymedio firmly. She has faced everything else—the threats, the questions on social media, the precariousness in Cuba, and the leap to an unknown country—with the conviction that being a mother means never giving up. Before Amanda’s condition completely changed their lives, Milagros worked as a designer in Sancti Spíritus, and her husband was a specialist at the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Environment.
The Ministry of Health authorized the transfer to Spain under “an agreement” between hospitals, explains Ortiz, who states that the family left the island with tourist visas.
The story began when Amanda was just a baby and was diagnosed with a rare liver disease, biliary atresia type III, which made a liver transplant vital. From the beginning, Ortiz had to deal with a lack of supplies, late diagnoses, and a healthcare system unable to respond. Between trips to Havana, hospital beds, and a lack of medication, she learned the details of her daughter’s illness, while Amanda’s deterioration became increasingly evident.
Desperate, in early 2024, Ortiz wrote a public letter that went viral on social media and attracted the support of thousands of Cubans inside and outside the country. Despite smear campaigns against her and fear of reprisals, the mother clung to the idea of saving Amanda. Social pressure was decisive: donations of food, clothing, diapers, and medicine poured in.
Finally, the Ministry of Health authorized the transfer to Spain under “an agreement” between hospitals, explains Ortiz, who claims the family left the island on tourist visas. “I didn’t believe anything until I was on the plane,” she says, referring to the comments she received from doctors in Cuba, State Security, and the slanderers on social media: “They said everything to me, but I wasn’t with anyone but my daughter. For her, for Amanda, I held on.”
On March 3, 2024, Amanda landed in Madrid and was immediately transferred to La Paz University Hospital. The contrast with what she experienced in Cuba still moves her mother. There, she slept on a hard chair; here, she was given a comfortable bed. There, she had to wait days for a clean sheet for her daughter; here, they change them daily. And most importantly, “here, they explain everything to you transparently.”
Just twelve days later, the little girl underwent a liver transplant. The donor was her own father. “He left the room first, pale, but alive. And then Amanda came in. When she left at six in the evening, I felt like we had all been given life back.”
The recovery was slow, with weeks in intensive care, but surrounded by care unimaginable in Cuba: constant monitoring, psychological care, even visits from clowns and volunteers who gave away toys. “And the best part: all within the public system, without owing a cent to anyone.”
Returning to the island is not an option: “Amanda can’t go to Cuba. With the medications she needs, it would be a disaster.
Today, Amanda, about to turn four, walks, eats well, and receives speech therapy to stimulate her speech. “The only thing missing is for her to start speaking more clearly, but everything else is going very well. The doctors are happy with her,” says her mother, who never leaves her side for a second.
With the help of activist Yamilka Lafita—the “Lara Crofs” of so many charitable cases—the family managed to raise funds on GoFundMe to start a new life in Madrid. That money covered the first few months’ rent, while the father and an uncle found work in workshops. Amanda, who already has Spanish nationality through her father, is starting school, and her mother hopes to legalize her status so she can bring the other daughter she left behind in Cuba.
Returning to the island is not an option: “Amanda can’t go to Cuba. With the medications she needs, it would be a disaster. Here is her life, here is her future.”
At the end of the conversation, the woman insists that her actions weren’t heroic: “I don’t feel like I did anything incredible. What I did was what I had to do as a mother.” And she leaves a message for those going through similar situations in Cuba: “You can’t be afraid. They depend on you, on no one else. If you let fear paralyze you, your child will die. Being a mother is already being brave: just as you push to give birth, you have to push to save your child’s life.”
Ortiz looks to the future with hope. She trusts that Amanda will be stronger and healthier, that everyone will be able to work and live in peace, with the family reunited and grateful. “We just want to live and enjoy our daughters,” she says. “I know everything will turn out well, because they are wonderful with children here.”
Amanda plays on the floor while her mother talks. The little girl, who was on the brink of death, smiles. And in that smile, Milagros Ortiz finds proof that all the pain and effort were worth it.
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