Author: 14ymedio

In his brief speech, the director of the magazine also reported that he had heard that the opposition activist Félix Navarro, also arrested after the 11J protests, is on a hunger strike in a prison in Matanzas. The former Black Spring prisoner was infected with covid-19 and was hospitalized a few days after his arrest.

According to La Hora de Cuba activist Bárbaro de Céspedes, known as El Patriota, was released from prison this Monday “with a precautionary measure of home confinement,” after being locked up since last July 11 for participating in the protests. The journalists of this Camagüey publication have been frequently harassed by the police authorities, who prevent them from carrying out their work. Constantín and Mariño were threatened with prosecution for a crime of “usurpation of legal capacity” — that is working as journalists without a license to do so, in a country that refuses to license independent journalists.

After learning of the reporters’ arrest on July 11, the Inter-American Press Association demanded the immediate release of Constantín, Rigau and Mariño, who had been imprisoned in the police unit known as Second Station.

For its part, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) also demanded the release of the independent media’s reporters and others under arrest, while urging the government to release them “immediately and unconditionally.”

“Cuban authorities have responded to the largest anti-government protests in the country in decades with expected hostility, attacks on members of the press and interruptions in internet service,” said Ana Cristina Núñez, CPJ researcher for Central and South America.

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“As of the end of 2020, 5,841 families have benefited from this concept, concluding 2,416 properties with different actions or totally new houses built. In the current year, 117 have been completed and the plan is to finish 5,658 dwellings,” an objective that is clearly complicated.

The article in the official newspaper of the Communist Party of Cuba, entitled How are the constructions going in the midst of the pandemic and the intensification of the blockade? highlights the tasks that have had to be prioritized in such a complicated scenario for the Cuban economy with regards to housing, a problem that affects hundreds of thousands of people on the island.

According to the latest available data, the housing deficit in Cuba reached 929,695 houses last year. Among the most affected provinces are Havana, with the lack of 185,348 homes; Holguín, with 115,965; and Santiago de Cuba, with 101,202.

But the ministry has prioritized some major works. Among them the renovation of the facilities of the Sierra Maestra Science, Technology and Innovation Entity (ECTI), the recovery of camps for the workforce, the clearing of the hectares for sowing plants, and the supplies of prefabricated elements in Pinar del Río. All of this as part of the reactivation of the program for the development of moringa cultivation devised by Fidel Castro, “which provides a response to agriculture and the health of our people.”

Mesa explains that two cement factories are also being built in Santiago de Cuba and Nuevitas, Camagüey, which are in the foundation stage, civil construction in infrastructure works and technological objects. The lack of cement has been behind the problems of private construction in recent years, and the authorities have even resorted to this argument to respond to the complaints of many Cubans who claim unsanitary conditions in their homes.

The material circulates on the black market at exorbitant prices, which sometimes exceed 1,000 pesos a bag, and it constantly prevents the completion of works or the solving of infrastructure problems, although its lack has not complicated the construction of luxury hotels — even when the pandemic has stopped tourism, nor the construction of the large concrete flag in front of the United States Embassy in Havana, in the so-called Anti-imperialist Platform.

Other works cited by the minister were the technological reconversion of Antillana de Acero, which is advancing with the intention of recovering other scarce material; ten ponds in Camagüey destined for the shrimp industry; and dozens of them in Villa Clara, Cienfuegos, Granma and Guantánamo for fishing, whose works are due to conclude this year.

Likewise, also mentioned was the completion of 14 rice drying plants, and other works related to biotechnology through Labiofam.

The pandemic has also required, since 2020, the intervention of the Ministry of Construction, with works in 20 hospitals, obtaining 15,118 individual isolation places (617 of them in the Ministry’s facilities), and the repair of facilities for 2,686 beds. Services are also provided with water pipes, road repairs and internal areas of hospital and service centers.

The text attributes, as usual, the problems to the “tightening of the US blockade against Cuba”, but praises the construction sector for being “an impressive force of thousands of workers dedicated to the fulfillment of decisive national economic plans, aware that in this branch lies a good part of the construction of that prosperous and sustainable socialism to which we all aspire.”

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The parents claim that, faced with the situation, they are forced to buy everything they need from resellers “at exorbitant prices” and that they do so with their children in mind: “our children do not understand the economic crisis, pandemic or problems.”

Santiago journalist and audiovisual producer Carlos Melián tells this newspaper that a few weeks ago he made a walk through the city in search of diapers: “A few months ago all the stores were full of disposable diapers and water, but lately they are all closed and when I have gone out to look for them I have not found any or they are available only in MLC [foreign currency].”

“Right now the fundamental problem is that to buying anything here in the MLC stores is difficult because they are full of coleros [people who stand in line for others] and there is a dawn [when one must get in line] and I am afraid of catching Covid,” explains Melián, the father of a one-and-a-half-year old. “What I decided was to wash the diapers by hand. It depresses me a lot to stand in those lines and expose myself to the disease, I prefer to do the wash every night.”

The supply of the product is also very irregular in Havana, says Marieta, mother of a two-month-old boy and a girl of 18-months, speaking tothis newspaper. “Sometimes I get some for the girl but not for the smallest baby because they do not sell all the sizes,” she explains. “People buy the product in foreign currency stores and then resell it. On the street a package for newborns can go up to 500 pesos.”

“Those who have families abroad who can buy them in digital stores are saved, because they can be found there, but you have to pay in dollars and from abroad,” he says. In several digital portals consulted by 14ymedio, the price of 36 baby diapers ranged between 15 and 20 dollars, but they are not sold for all stages there either.

Many mothers have returned to the custom of cloth diapers, but the option complicates the day-to-day with continuous washing and the high consumption of detergent. “The few disposables that I get I use on some days of the week but most of the time I have them on cloth, it is a slavery because the washing never ends,” adds Marieta.

“The ones that we buy for now, which are the Premium Plus, are made here in Cuba, in Mariel, they cost 275 pesos but you can only buy two per person,” says a couple from the Cuban capital with a 10-month-old baby. “We buy the Premium because they are better, the difference is noticeable, in reality there always is, but there is a limitation on the quantity.”

Added to the instability in the sale of the pampers are other concerns of the Santiago parents. In their letter they propose that it be considered to include “all the products in the supply book, in the basket or sell them as modules.” They point out that “it is necessary to guarantee the sale of food for children from six months of age” upon presentation of the minor’s card and at the price of the State.

“An adult may be able to stop eating one day (which is not ideal because we must have our body fed to raise, fight for our children, work), but a child needs proteins, meats, food, vegetables for their growth and proper development, but with such high prices,” it becomes very difficult to feed babies, they explain.

They also demand that “the cycle of delivery of milk in the warehouses” be complied with, that medicines be “commercialized in a controlled manner,” the sale of household electrical equipment such as fans and mixers, and that the prices of food be reviewed “because they are in the clouds.”

They complained about the exclusive sale of sweets in MLC: “Beyond what can be explained to them, it is frustrating, in these times of confinement, that a child asks you for a lollipop, jams, sweets, telling you that they are hungry but that they don’t want food and you don’t have to give him, not being able to please him with such basic things. “

At the end of the document they made it clear that they will continue to insist on finding solutions in “any instance.”

“When it comes to a child there are no limits, there are no barriers, we stop living ourselves, to live for them.”

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“There are patients who are so bad that they put up only a minimal resistance but there are others who do not, there are others who have to suffer it, open their mouths, sometimes there are even broken teeth, sometimes they survive, sometimes not,” laments another doctor from Havana, very affected by this situation.

“When you put the patient on the ventilator without sedation, they are tied to the ventilator and there is a ventilatory discomfort that causes the patient’s ventilatory rate to go one way and the ventilator the other.” He adds that “if the patient were sedated, the frequency of the patient would be the same as that of the ventilator and better breathing can be achieved because otherwise the objective, which is to ventilate the patient well, is not achieved.”

The nightmare of testing positive for covid and “having to enter a hospital because your symptoms worsen” can begin “from the moment you call an ambulance and it does not appear,” Eloisa, a young woman who survived covid after spending 21 days in a therapy room.

“When you think the worst has happened and you are already in an intensive care room, you realize that the nightmare is not over, that it is just beginning. The dead passed through the corridor every half hour and that was terrifying, luckily for me I did not have to be intubated because I responded well but my family had to bring everything, even the oximeter to measure the oxygen saturation in the blood because there were none in the hospital,”he complains.

“Those rooms are a total disaster, the doctors work with all their strength but with very few resources and with the minimum means of protection. Some days I saw how the doctors had to deal with oxygen blackouts of up to two hours,” adds the young man.

In the midst of the oxygen crisis in almost all the country’s hospitals the local Cienfuegos press said that 20 “concentrators had arrived in the province “to support the fight against the pandemic.”

Dr. Duniesky González Rodríguez, director of the Provincial Medical Supplies Company in that province, explained that they come from Mexico and that “flights from China are being expected in the next few hours” with more equipment of this type. “You know the real situation that the province has today, not only with the high incidence of covid cases but with the lack of oxygen,” he added.

As reported this Saturday by the official press, in the last two days a “more stable” supply of oxygen has been achieved for the hospitals of the capital, an improvement that allows “ensuring continued coverage for the almost 500 admissions that require it; 128 of them are treated with artificial ventilation in intensive care units and 369 in general wards.”

The report detailed that health care institutions such as Freyre de Andrade, known as Emergency, and Joaquín Albarrán, located on Avenida 26, “had experienced a tense situation in the coverage” of oxygen and that for that reason they were “especially benefited with a group of containers that ensure the existence of this product for 8 to 10 days.”

Dr. Emilio Delgado Iznaga, provincial director of Health, assured this Saturday during a meeting with the authorities of Havana, that “the delivery of medicinal oxygen and compressed air” to the 82 polyclinics in the capital was resumed, “to attend to the patients with acute respiratory infections or other illnesses that need this drug.” The official’s statement reaffirms the controversial use of compressed air as a substitute for medicinal oxygen, which has generated so much criticism.

Delgado Iznaga also announced that this Saturday the province received 95 oxygen concentrators “for home distribution,” which, together with another 10, will be able to “serve the hundred convalescents who need it daily in their homes.”

Recently dozens of Cuban doctors denounced through videos shared on social networks, the health collapse that the country is experiencing and demanded supplies they need to carry out their work. They also protested against the criticism of the sector launched by Prime Minister Manuel Marrero.

“Our patients need help,” said angiology and vascular surgery resident Julio C. Hernández. “We also need help, we do not want more people to die,” adds the doctor in his brief complaint dated August 16.

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The complaints of patients and relatives warning of lack of oxygen, with alarming crises in provinces such as Ciego de Ávila, Villa Clara, Camagüey, Cienfuegos and Holguín, led to a propaganda marathon by the authorities on the distribution of medicinal oxygen on the island.

The amount of oxygen a covid patient needs is impossible to determine: it depends on their condition and the time required for assistance, which can be days or months. But the needs of countries where the explosion of the pandemic arrived earlier give an idea of the quantities required. In Spain, the largest manufacturer of this product explained in April 2020 (when deaths in the country were close to a thousand a day) that the demand had multiplied by four, by seven in Madrid (the most affected region) and, in the worst days, by ten.

As of last March, according to the State newspaper Granma, Gases Industriales Company, OxiCuba, located in the capital had last March, according to Granma, “the capacity to generate more production than that demanded by the Health system,” while in Santiago de Cuba it produced only 5% of the national demand on that date and covered the orders of the eastern region.

The official newspaper did not say how much medical oxygen the Cuban health system demanded, but according to data from the National Office of Statistics and Information (Onei), Cuba produced 20,726.8 million cubic meters in 2020, well below the 31,612 million of 2015, which gives an idea of the level of shortages that the country is suffering with a pandemic that has increased demand exponentially.

In the midst of the biggest wave of the pandemic, the worst news came: the breakage of a piece at the Havana plant, which kicked off this obstacle course to achieve one of the most necessary treatments in this context and whose current production is unknown.

Gases Industriales Santiago produces 930 cylinders a day, which it distributes mainly to the province’s health system, Granma and Guantánamo, but in recent days at least Holguín and Las Tunas have joined. To this production are added the 360 cylinders every 24 hours in charge of the military factories and the Russian plant installed at the San Antonio de los Baños Air Base.

In Las Tunas, the Stainless Steel Company produces barely 1,300 to 1,500 liters per day and in Holguín the support of the Gas Processing Complex of the military region was added, which according to a Cuban television report contributes about “seven cylinders” per hour (168 daily).

In Camagüey, in addition to the 250 medical oxygen cylinders that the territory’s business unit made last February, another 280 reinforcement units are added, which are “distributed in the 13 hospital centers of Camagüey, in addition to some thirty polyclinics in all municipalities,” according to a report in Prensa Latina published this Tuesday.

With the doubt about how many liters or cubic meters are produced per day and how many are being consumed on average, the official press has tried to calm a population desperate for gas, but when it has not fallen in the propaganda, it has contributed to sowing confusion.

A Public Health director, quoted by the Havana Tribune , admitted this Wednesday that in recent months compressed air had been used as a substitute for medicinal oxygen, which “also reported a deficit in recent days.”

Directors of Gases Industriales Santiago told the Cuban News Agency that “they produce compressed air, which allows saving medicinal oxygen, with problems in its coverage” and national television published Wednesday that the Marlin Azulmar Navy of Ciego de Ávila was bottling compressed air used for scuba tanks.

The information was also shared on the Facebook page of Televisión Avileña and withdrawn shortly after panic spread among some users over the use of this gas in patients with covid.

“The 40% oxygen reached with this filling is insufficient for serious and critical patients, but it is necessary and sufficient for those who arrive at a duty station with respiratory deficit because it is twice what we normally breathe in the atmosphere. It is a way to stabilize the patient and then give them the necessary treatment,” Televisión Avileña responded to several users, although fear is still in the environment.

Unlike other products that are easily available in the informal market, medicinal oxygen is scarce in illegal networks and sellers only market with highly trusted contacts, fearing strict police surveillance over that product. Its size and the need to have its own cylinder to carry out these clandestine operations make it even more difficult to purchase through this route.

A source from the Institute of Neurology and Neurosurgery confirmed to this newspaper that, even with the gas deficit in recent days, some cylinders continue to go to the black market. Between Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, there were gaps in the medical center allocation, the source said. “When the truck arrived with the cylinders, it did not bring the amount that was stated in the documents. Apparently they tried to sneak the missing one to the person in charge at the hospital, but they could not and had to leave without unloading the oxygen.”

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The family was never informed that in prison the artist was infected with covid-19, a fact that was only learned thanks to detainees who were released. They also did not have access to Zamora’s file nor did they know the charges against him.

Navarro explained that El Radikal was being investigated by the military prosecutor’s office and that a criminal investigator had told the family “verbally” that he was accused of “public disorder,” “robbery with force” and “disturbances.” Others of those arrested for these 11J protests, such as Eduardo Manuel Báez, 22, are also being charged for those offenses.

Báez’s father told this newspaper that “since the MLC stores* belong to the army” then “it is the military prosecutor’s office that is making the accusations” and added that they have not even allowed him to hire a lawyer for his son.

Rapper Randy Arteaga is still in prison, having also been arrested on July 11 in front of the Santa Clara Palace of Justice. “Witnesses, and the video of his arrest, indicate that he suffered physical violence at the time of his arrest,” said Osvaldo Navarro.

The list of detainees and disappeared, drawn up by a group of volunteers in collaboration with the Cubalex Legal Information Center, counts 391 protesters still in prison, four of them in “forced disappearance.”

*Translator’s note: ’MLC stores’ are stores that only accept payment in foreign currencies (MLC).

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“On August 4 we worked with 67 [deceased], on the 3rd with 61 and on the first day of August with 80,” of the latter 69 were in the city. The official data published by the Ministry of Public Health for these two days gave, respectively, 9 and 8 deaths in Guantánamo, instead of the 67 and 80 managed by the Communal Services, and registered a national total of 93 and 98 deaths for those same dates.

The page that analyzes the data of the Ministry of Public Health has been idle for days and has been updated twice in the last month when it used to be updated daily. “Due to the fact that the way of reporting the deceased by the Minsap was changed, we will be making some changes in the project and, therefore, we will not update, for a few days. We will soon be up to date again. We apologize for the inconvenience,” says the website.

The rapid expansion of capacities in cemeteries, the shortage of hearses and the data provided by so many Cubans on dead relatives or acquaintances all gives an idea that the death figures should be higher than those officially reported.

The way of counting deaths from coronavirus has been controversial in most countries of the world, since very different criteria have been followed. In Europe, where the first wave caught unexpectedly and overwhelmed the systems, each country counted in its own way: France only added those who died in hospitals, Spain did not include those who died in nursing homes without a test, Italy those who had negative PCR and Germany was late incorporating them based on the data set, among other examples. Added to this chaos was the testing shortage in March 2020.

However, little by little, most of these countries have brought the figures closer to reality, with the incorporation of tens of thousands of people in the official records some time later, and also using the statistics of excess mortality over previous years.

The comments of the Cuban Minister of Health suggest that the authorities have realized that they cannot maintain an optimistic discourse when images multiply — even in the official provincial press — of collapsed hospitals and cemeteries.

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However, the provincial press continues to move the pieces. A few days ago the Ciego de Ávila newspaper confirmed the lack of oxygen and the precarious situation in the area, and now it is September 5, the official Cienfuegos newspaper, which speaks of an “unprecedented scenario” in an article titled Covid-19 in Cienfuegos: The truth on the Table.

The newspaper denounces the fact that diagnostic tests are lacking, PCRs pile up without results, there is poor management of cases in primary care according to their risk, and that people end up in serious condition in hospitals due to the lack of screening. Added to this is the lack of medicinal oxygen — despite the incorporation of the Armed Forces and Russia into production — and the shortage of medicines and medical supplies.

To all this is added, the newspaper continues, that what the Government promised does not always arrive. “I must tell you that there are problems with food, that in not a few cases breakfast has been eaten late and lunch appears in the afternoon. It also happens that after discharge people have to wait up to three and four hours for transportation,” denounces a citizen.

September 5 also addresses one of the most serious problems, the lack of healthcare personnel. According to the newspaper, of the 701 doctors in the province, 446 are working. Most of those absent are in the care of children and relatives, but many others have tested positive for covid-19.

“There are reports of low medical coverage in isolation centers, this affects the quality of care for patients and represents an overload for the healthcare personnel who work in these spaces (…) In a visit to the Carlos Roloff vocational pre-university, from Cumanayagua, there were 250 people admitted and there were only two doctors to attend that universe,” details Félix Duarte Ortega, of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC).

The newspaper reports that the “political authorities of Cienfuegos recognized the effort of those who work in hospitals and isolation centers, in clinics and polyclinics. Those who do not give up despite the thousand and one difficulties that are experienced today.” The strategy is part of the pro-government dynamic of recent days, which tries to soften the conflict created by Prime Minister Manuel Marrero when he blamed doctors, specifically from Cienfuegos, for the violations of protocols that promote the spread of covid-19.

The rebellion of the doctors has grown since that day, both among the usual critics of the regime and in those who believe in it but watched the spectacle of being blamed for managing the disease when they have to fight in the front line against it devoid of resources, and in a framework of war medicine.

“The medical personnel exist and are sacrificing themselves, what does not exist are the means. Many of us believe that they are subjecting us to genocide. While the people die they are watching the doctors to see what they say, if they are in favor or not of the Revolution,” denounces the doctor from Cienfuegos.

President Miguel Díaz-Canel has been tweeting praises to healthcare personnel for three days in an attempt to redirect the situation. On Sunday, when the clamor of the health workers spread through the networks calling for the resignation of Marrero, he said, with little luck: “Today the groups in which we go through life are more visible, according to José Martí: On the one hand those who love and create. And on the other, those who hate and destroy. The former do not lie or slander or defame, they do not hate. They are saving lives. The others cannot with that light.”

A day later, he rectified the divisive message with another that only had a positive tone: “What we have seen the most in this time is the patriotism of our people, the Healthcare personnel, the scientists, of all those involved in the millimeter-level oxygen operation, people who are working full time in complex situations. Thank you all! ” That same day, the official press vindicated the doctors with an article titled At the foot of the patient, the hero who does not serve enemy campaigns, which once again separated the like-minded from the critics.

Yesterday, Tuesday, the campaign continued, with an image on the cover with the faces of doctors and nurses in the article entitled Let’s think about them and take care of ourselves. “Gratitude for the titanic feat assumed by our Health workers in this battle against covid-19 also requires, now more than ever, our responsibility,” says the official newspaper, on this occasion, taking care to refer to the ’rebels.’

Ernesto Haber Santos, a doctor at the Saturnino Lora Hospital in Santiago de Cuba, has rejected, through Facebook, the government’s campaign called Put your heart in it, with a view to once again winning the favor of his star workers for decades.

“We work with the little we have and the hardest we can. Tired, leaving our family and putting it at risk. But one is not willing to publicly assume reality, it is better to look for a culprit, and from what I see, everyone is worth it. We have plenty, we are leaving it it the ground, and at the rate we are going we will have to continue leaving it until who knows when,” he said.

The doctor asks the Government to accept that the situation has reached the limit and to accept help. “The covid-19 overcame us, overcame the United States, Spain and Vietnam,” claims the doctor, who asks the authorities to rectify and recognize the excellence of the countr’s health workers or, on the contrary, to say if they are graduating untrained people and “pride in our medical power is a delusion.”

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