Without Tourists and With Businesses Closed, Soroa is Sunk in Crisis

As the days go by, life becomes more difficult for those who rent rooms to foreigners in Soroa. (14ymedio)

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14ymedo, Bertha K. Guillén, Soroa, 25 April 2020 — Until recently, the highway to Soroa, in the province of Artemisa, was a continuous coming and going of vehicles loaded with tourists. The travelers supported the economy of most of the families in the area, but after the closure of the borders because of Covid-19, the locals are trying to adapt to a bleak scenario.

As the days go by, life becomes more difficult for those who rent rooms to foreigners, organize excursions through the impressive nature of the area, or offer food or transportation services. Where once there was liveliness, now you only see empty paths and worried faces.

The basic necessities are beginning to be scarce, and the savings have been diminishing little by little. Not even the most prosperous self-employed in the area manage to maintain the standard of living that their businesses allowed them until recently. continue reading

Soroa, in the heart of Sierra del Rosario, has been for years an ideal place for practicing nature tourism. Just one hour from Havana, it earned the name of “the Rainbow of Cuba” for the diversity of its ecosystem, which allows visitors to choose between horseback riding, hiking in the mountains, medicinal baths, and the enjoyment of orchids or bird watching.

Amid so much beauty, residents must now look for alternatives to meet basic food and grooming needs. Santiago, 58, has spent years selling orchids, an illegal but very common practice in the area. With the number of tourists plummeting, he had to start raising turkeys and Creole chickens to ensure at least food to eat. “We have to wait until this crisis passes and tourism returns, in the meantime we will have to invent,” he says.

The houses, which until recently offered quiet accommodation in contact with nature, gradually become gardens. Neighbors who formerly knew precisely when the high season began, what nationalities were coming the most, or where fresh fish and shellfish could be bought for travelers’ table, now have other concerns.

Finishing a flower bed has become the priority of María Caridad, an entrepreneur who is in quarantine with all her children in the house that until recently she rented to tourists. For years, the family has planted their root crops, vegetables and greens around the house because they do not have any agricultural markets nearby.

Finishing a flower bed has become the priority for María Caridad, an entrepreneur who in quarantines the house that until recently she rented to tourists in Soroa. (14ymedio)

Thanks to this production, this month they have a good part of their food needs guaranteed but they have increased the planting rate in order to prepare for an uncertain summer, in which for the first time in a long time they will not have income from tourism.

“In this area there are no markets, no hard currency stores, you have to go to Candelaria,” María Caridad explains to 14ymedio. The town of Candelaria is located about 16 kilometers from her home and only a few vehicles pass by the road every day.

María Caridad’s children have helped her plant pumpkin, sweet potato, tomatoes, radish, cabbage, oregano, lettuce and bell pepper. “We have distributed seeds in the community so that everyone who has a little piece of yard also sows,” she says. However, there are products that they cannot achieve with their own efforts. “The lack of oil and toiletries like toothpaste and soap continues to hit us.”

In nearby Candelaria, for the moment, there is no positive case for Covid-19, but the pandemic has paralyzed the economic life of a mainly agricultural and swine-raising region that had been going through serious difficulties for months.

This April, the center of the small town is deserted and the fruit carts  loaded with mamey, guava or bananas that rolled through the streets are gone.

Alejandro, 35, has started stacking dry firewood to make a charcoal oven. In other times he would be renting his horses to the tourists of the nearby houses or offering to transport them. With these activities, he supported his family, although his legal job is to cut fronds to obtain the palm that feeds the pigs.

“With the problems that there are with cooking gas and soon with electricity, coal will be needed,” predicts Alejandro. The man puts his hopes in the idea that charcoal will rise in market value in the coming weeks due to power cuts and a possible decrease in the supply of liquefied gas.

“In these towns no one is selling cooking gas on the streets and the contracts are few, people bring the canisters from Havana, but now with closed borders, charcoal is the best solution.”

A sack of charcoal can cost up to 60 pesos in Candelaria and reaches 100 pesos in the towns.

For Mariana, 35, the coronavirus has also been a life change. She has started making croquettes to sell door to door in her neighborhood after the rental house where she worked in cleaning closed to tourists. “I am a single mother. I tried to offer my services to wash and clean, but with this situation nobody wants people in their houses,” she regrets.

There is an air of uncertainty. Although in the last decades the region has been hit several times by hurricanes and intense droughts, in addition to suffering the ups and downs of flexibilities and restrictions on agricultural producers, the situation that has caused the coronavirus is completely new. Unlike those moments, few now dare to predict when this crisis will end.

Like a ghost, in the minds of Mariana and many others older than 30, are the memories of the crisis of the 90s. The mere idea of reliving moments similar to those caused by the Special Period frightens. “The situation is desperate. There are days when I would like to stay in bed and sleep, just to avoid stress, but I can’t.”

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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 Mysterious Medical Alliance Between Cuba and Andorra

Cuban health workers at the entrance to their hotel in Andorra, where they were met with the applause of their colleagues

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Madrid, April 15, 2020 — Little apparently connects Cuba with Andorra, the first with a yearly income of barely 7,470 Euros per capita, and the latter enjoying an income of 35,975 Euros per inhabitant, per year. Nonetheless, the arrival at the end of March of a medical brigade sent by Havana to the tiny principality has almost become the storyline of a movie.

Three months have gone by since the Cuban health brigade arrived in Andorra to support the country’s health personnel in its battle with Covid-19. Since then, there has been much publicity but few concrete data about the cooperation between the impoverished communist country and the tax haven with which it re-established relations in 1995 during the time of Fidel Castro. All is mystery. This news source has asked the Andorran Ministry of Health to see the agreement, but has not received an answer to date. According to local media, the text has yet to be formalized.

All that’s known for certain is the cost that was incurred for a part of the trip, amounting to 19,811.60 Euros. This past Wednesday, the Official Bulletin of the Principality of Andorra (BOPA) has made public the statement in which the Spanish airline Iberia charged for a round trip of “medical equipment for health emergency”. To this expense it is necessary to add the trip from Madrid to Old Andorra, which was undertaken by bus on the twenty-third of March, given that the principality has no airport of its own. continue reading

The arrival was beset with mishap. With a health worker testing positive for the coronavirus and the entire team being put in quarantine, it came to light this weekend that the expense in the agreement of cooperation would be defrayed by a private family of foreign origin, though residing in Andorra for several decades.

The Andorran Ministry of Finance, Eric Jover, explained in a news conference that the Sirkia family will take in hand all charges that otherwise would be laid to the public treasury by the presence of the Cuban doctors in the Principality. The family, he said, “has offered to make this donation and we thank them very much, since they will take charge of all the expenses of the agreement under which we have brought over the Cuban doctors.”

Who are this family? Little is known. Although an Andorran doctor gives out that they are a family of Cuban origin, this news source has been unable to find any connection between the Island and the Sirkia family, which formerly owned one of the luxury jewelry stores on Meritxell Avenue which crosses the capital of the Principality and its annex Escaldes-Engordany where the health workers are lodged.

The Finance Ministry announced, some weeks ago, a fund of public subscription for collecting money destined for the battle against the coronavirus, the total of which has reached 1.6 millon Euros. Part of this money was collected by SMS, although the most robust donations were those of the International Club which sent in at least 80,000 Euros taken up amongst its members, or [donations] during the skiing season (one of the great sources of revenue for the country specializing in winter tourism), which yielded 50,000 Euros; the Automobile Club, over 9,000 Euros; and from a neighborhood association for the Ransol quarter with more than 5,000 Euros. But to date it is not evident whether anyone has decided on a concrete recipient for the money other than the Cuban brigade.

To the lack of informed cooperation from the Principality is added the habitual opaqueness on the Cuban side which eludes answers to direct questions. The Cuban consul in Barcelona, Alain González who keeps track of the group, offered an interview with Diari D’Andorra this past Friday in which he dodged repeated questions concerning the budgeting of this agreement.

“What expenses did Andorra run for the stay of this brigade?” asked a journalist. “I do not have that information,” the consul replied, directing him to the Andorran authorities.

“How do you measure the monetary value of the brigades sent overseas?” emphasized the interviewer. “I shall ask you a question — do you think that solidarity has a monetary value?” retorted González. There are things that [have no monetary measure] and go beyond economic reach.”

The reporter, however, would not relent. “I shall not go back to Cuba with empty hands …” he replied. “Cuban solidarity never has been motivated by economic interest. What motivates us here is to give support to the Andorran people.” The journalist persisted without giving ground. “Insist on disconnecting philanthropy from business.” To which the consul replied, “We share what we have, and not what we have left over, and this is one way to face the philosophy of life. Solidarity is inherent in our way of thinking … we are not going to look for loot, we are not corsairs, we are not mercenaries, we are not pirates. These are doctors who voluntarily join a mission,” he emphasized.

Although the interviewer repeatedly questioned, reminding González that the sale of medical services is one of the principal sources of income for Cuba, and not for the professionals themselves, the consul settled the matter saying, “That is not the case with the brigade that is here.”

The verbal dispute continued when the journalist asked him to assure that these health workers in Andorra work in decent conditions, and the Cuban continued to elude the question, vouching for the professionalism of the workers, the majority of whom, he explained, have abandonned their country to exercise their calling with dignity, and who feel pride for the Cuban people.

“We haven’t come to create propaganda, nor to look for recognition nor economic benefit. We simply are responding to an appeal from Andorra and humanity,” he affirmed.

This same periodical published an interview this Tuesday with the leader of the brigade, Dr. Luis Enrique Pérez Ulloa. The question was put to him again about the economic interests of these missions, to which the doctor replied that this the question only reveals unfamiliarity with the Cuban public health system, which is “purely altruistic”.

The journalist was interested in the purchasing power of the salaries received by the contingent and whether they adapt to the cost of living in Andorra, to which Pérez Ulloa replied that they are lacking for nothing. “What better example than being here and hearing the notes of the Cuban national anthem sound off from the balconies each evening at eight p.m. And when you walk to the hospital, you see people applauding … this goes to the heart and fills us with pride. This is the best gift we have received, and this cannot be bought with money.”

The interview, like the news about the family that underwrites the agreement, has caused strong disagreements in comments to the online press. Some citizens are grateful to the Sirkia family for having decided to invest part of their money toward medical assisstance, while others are suspicious of the circumstances of the agreement, and claim that taxes and not donations are what supports the public expense.

There are those who applaud this cooperation with the Cuban doctors, regardless of how the agreements were drawn up, while others think that the health workers might be exposed to the habitual conditions of Havana, and reject it.

In Andorra, there have been 659 persons infected with Covid-19 to date, of which 160 have recovered and 31 have died — an extremely high rate of mortality, at 4.7%.

Cuban doctors took up positions at their usual work posts this past Monday after spending several days in quarantine due to one off their members testing positive for Covid-19, and a week off to familiarize themselves with El Cedre, a social health center in which the elderly or handicapped usually reside and which has been outfitted as an auxiliary care center for those ill with coronavirus, initially the less severe cases. The severe ones go to the hospital Nostra Senyora de Meritxell.

Translated by: Pedro Antonio Gallet Gobin

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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.

Government Blames Cuban Families for Increase in Energy Consumption

Energy demand in households has exploded and is not offset by the drop in use by large consumers. (EFE)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 23 April 2020  — Energy consumption has increased atypically in Cuba during this period of confinement. With the increase in the amount of time that citizens stay home, national electricity consumption has risen 10% despite the closure of some companies and large hotel facilities.

“Although sectors such as tourism and other non-essentials are declining, that hardly represents a decrease of 3% in consumption. That figure does not compensate for the increase seen in the consumption by Cuban households,” said Liván Arronte Cruz, Minister of Energy and Mines, reported yesterday on the Roundtable TV show.

According to Elaine Moreno Carnet, general director of the Office for the Rational Use of Energy, consumption is growing in the residential sector at the same time that large consumers are maintaining their usual activities, especially steel mills, light and chemical industries, and cement, agriculture, nickel and oil. continue reading

Cuban economist Elías Amor, resident in Spain, expresses his surprise at the official justifications. “No one explained that, for the same reason, the consumption of electricity in companies that have stopped or reduced operations, in hotels and in establishments in the budgeted sector must have plummeted since the beginning of the confinement. One would think that this drop in consumption should complement and even appear as a surplus, since industry, without going any further, is  a more intensive consumer than are families.”

The argument is consistent with the electrical use pattern in Spain, where the fall in use by large consumers in March was 8.2%. Electricity demand fell between 5% and 10% in the first seven days of the state of alarm and, despite the increase in household consumption, the drop in services and industry led to a sharp decline during the first week of confinement, although in that country the confinement has been strict and the paralysis almost total, except in essential sectors.

The minister said yesterday that the Government has focused on ensuring consumption in hospitals or isolation centers, as well as essential activities, including some that are specifically needed at the moment, such as the production of calcium carbonate and salt, essential for cleaning supplies, and sodium chlorine and hypochlorite (i.e. bleach).

“The production plan for nickel is being met, while national oil production is exceeded, work in the mines is maintained and the refineries remain stable,” the minister explained. He added that there are maintenance works in several generating units to give greater stability to the national electricity system.

“The generation of electricity in Cuba works in a stable way, especially due to the effort made to maintain generation and avoid blackouts, amid difficult conditions imposed by the US blockade and the rise in consumption in homes as a result of the necessary social isolation,” he said, not forgetting the obligatory reference to Washington’s supposed responsibility for Cuba’s shortages.

The minister admitted that the heavy weight of diesel is a drag on the economy, because it is expensive and is used to generate more energy at peak demand. “If we need more diesel than planned, that conspires against other activities in the economy, such as transportation,” he added before invoking savings again, even though transportation is largely paralyzed.

Armando Cepero Hernández, general director of the Electricity Union of Cuba, downplayed the power outages that have occurred in recent weeks and insisted that they are a consequence of the increase in loads caused by more people staying at home, along with the effort to air condition rooms given the high temperatures of recent days.

The official notes that the offices to pay for electricity are closed but it is possible to make the payment electronically if you want to avoid the accumulation of bills. For those who do not, collections will be made when the epidemiological situation improves.

Moreno Carnet urged companies and households to consume responsibly, especially in the middle of the day, when greater peaks in demand are taking place.

For the economist Elías Amor, in addition to the problems of energy production in Cuba, there is the terrible state of the aerial networks and lines that cause continuous breakdowns, as a consequence of the lack of investments. “However, … the fault, in the event of the inevitable blackouts, lies with the Cubans, who leave their refrigerator door open or do not turn off a light bulb. The leaders are never responsible for the decisions they make, or don’t make.”

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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 Orders Came From Above"

The hotels had put food for sale at high prices for the average Cuban. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 24 April 2020 — In the Comodoro Hotel the food delivery service is shut down. It is not the only one in the capital to have suspended a service launched earlier this month, after authorities asked the population to restrict their outings to contain the spread of the coronavirus. But one of its workers has revealed to 14ymedio that the orders are coming from above.

“How is it that whoever has a few more convertible pesos can eat roasted chicken brought home, while we are seeing the tremendous lines in the stores every day?” The employee believes that the authorities have ordered the suspension of the service to avoid the “such great differences” that are being generated between those who can afford the high prices of the hotel offerings and those who must hopelessly line up.

“That was canceled a few days ago,” says another Comodoro worker, who maintains that they do not plan to restart the initiative. “First we canceled the home delivery of alcoholic beverages and now we also suspended the delivery of the food combos we were giving out,” he says. continue reading

“Call from tomorrow because this service has been paralyzed by some problems we have had,” responds an employee of the Meliá Cohiba hotel when asked about the same service.

The Iberostar Parque Central Hotel was one of the first to offer, in early April, these offers of prepared food and food packages, which only lasted a few weeks.

The announcement generated controversy because, at the high prices of the dishes, with delivery, it cost more than 30 CUC to receive food at home. Just 24 hours later, after criticism on social networks, the establishment modified the offering, eliminating the condition of the minimum amount, but the food rates were maintained.

A month later it is impossible to contact the service. No one responds to emails or answers one of the two phone numbers provided to place orders. The other number is simply out of service. 14ymedio was only able to get responses from several employees on a visit to the hotel.

“We have paused everything to restructure the sale,” a Parque Central worker kindly explains when asked about the reasons for the suspension. Another employee, however, considers it unlikely that the service will resume in the short term. “Everything happened, the phones did not stop ringing, there were people who sent to buy up to seven packages of meatballs for home delivery, while a person would need to line up for at least four hours at a store for the same thing,” says the worker, who prefers not to give her name.

The Parque Central offerings included hamburgers, pizzas and meats with garnishes but “what was most in demand were the precooked meatballs and croquettes, in addition to a basket costing 35 CUC that included different types of sausages and cheese,” explains the employee.

Home delivery menu items from the Meliá Cohiba Hotel.

“The number of calls was such that we could not process them,” he alleges.

“I cannot go out every day to buy food because I have to work from home and I was resolving a lot with that service, especially lunch. For a few days now it has become difficult for me to find hotels with home delivery, even from the Parque Central it’s not available,” says Mercedes Rivero, a resident of the Plaza de la Revolución municipality, speaking to 14ymedio.

Rivero explains that she now gets food for her family of four with some private restaurants that have home delivery. “It is expensive, I cannot always pay for it, but it is an alternative for difficult days. My sister lives in Miami and sometimes she helps me. Yesterday I ordered some pizzas and soft drinks and the boys from Mandao brought it to me at the door of my house,” she said.

This courier and food delivery service has spent four years trying to make its way on the island and finally seems to have found a business niche. Those who manage to avoid others by not going outside will have gained something during this health crisis.

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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’s Freelance Vendors Are Not Heeding the Warnings of Diaz-Canel

As an alternative to lining up for several hours, many Cubans turn to the informal market.

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, April 22, 2020 — Freelance vendors on mopeds pass through the Casino Deportivo neighborhood. They know that this is one of the most high-income areas in Havana. They offer the same products that require hours in line in front of a store, but which they will bring to people’s houses for twice and even three times the price.

A package of frozen chicken that costs five CUC in the state market they will sell for twelve. “Don’t go out and put yourself at risk to buy this,” one vendor warned a lady who hesitated this past Tuesday. “Everything is brought to your door and without danger, because this merchandise is washed beforehand so that there is no contagion,” adds the man who is riding an electric moped.

Higher income families are ready to pay much more for the groceries than they cost a few weeks ago in order to avoid crowds. The resellers know this, and have begun to offer home delivery. continue reading

The greater part of the merchandise is filched from state storehouses, from hotel kitchens that have been paralyzed by lack of tourism, from stores where their own employees have redirected a portion of the stock to the black market, or from the so-called “gatherers” who stand on line several times or who go with their whole families in order to obtain a greater measure of the foodstuffs that are rationed.

Regarding these resellers and “gatherers”, Miguel Diez-Canel spoke yesterday, saying he had received many reports referring to those who are dedicated to these activities, along with others who wander about without apparent purpose despite the authorities’ appeal to stay at home unless it’s a necessity to go out.

“We have to act against these also, nobody here can be engaged in illicit activity, nobody here is authorized to sell or to resell anything, this cannot be permitted,” stated the leader in the daily meeting of the workers’ group for the prevention and control of coronavirus.

“What little we have we are trying to give out in the stores and in the distribution chains in our markets. And here, there is nothing to explain, it’s to act with severity, because these are the people who are making the situation more complicated,” he said.

The black market is getting ahold of the technologies that guarantee its survival and that elude control. Orders are broadcast via online portals for buying and selling, and by WhatsApp threads, Telegram groups or by word of mouth. The advertisements for the sale of ready-to-serve foods last but a few minutes on the most popular classified ad sites.

“I had it up until yesterday, but it’s already gone, call tomorrow to see if I have any more,” replied by telephone a freelance vendor who had announced an offer of cheese, ham, sausage and powdered milk on the website Revolico. “The merchandise took off!” he told an anxious buyer who had called some ten stores but without any success at all.

To evade the police, the vendors prefer to deliver to clients’ houses in order to prevent clients from coming to their own.”Hold up! Hold up! Let this person go by,” a  householder in Nuevo Vedado was cautioned by the man who arrived downstairs at his house on an electric moped with his wife on board. Shortly, after an elderly man had disappeared down the street, the freelance vendor took from his knapsack two bags of powdered milk.

The man on the street took and rapidly placed the merchandise in another bag and pretended to shake hands to take his leave. In reality, he slipped two bills to pay for the purchase and to avoid the curious gazes of neighbors. The surveillance networks which until a few weeks ago had overlooked these operations, now are more alert.

“They have instructed us that we need to avoid people gathering in lines, and to keep a distance of a meter, but also that we make rounds in the neighborhood to identify the resellers,” explained 68-year-old Manuel, an activist in the Communist Party and denizen of El Cerro. With a green mask, the retired man patrols the vicinity of The Cupet in Ayestarán Street, a frequent hub of informal marketing.

“Yesterday, we discovered a couple of illegal operations selling agricultural products and also frozen foods. We turned them in at once to the High Command,” he explained. The penalties for these clandestine operations are difficult to foresee in a situation such as the present one in which the government applies punishments as away of setting examples.

Translated by: Pedro Antonio Gallet Gobin

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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.

Masks Are Not Gags

The journalist Mónica Baró, winner of an award from the Gabo Foundation, is one of the journalists who has suffered an interrogation and a fine.

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Yoani Sánchez, Generation Y, 22 April 2020 — While the coronavirus rages in Latin America, another enemy – not as tiny – is also gaining ground. Authoritarianism takes advantage of the health emergency and the fear of citizens to cut freedoms, crush rights and impose tight control over daily life. In a few weeks we have regressed many years and the steps backward could accelerate in the coming days.

Along with the necessary calls for social confinement, restrictions on mobility and the closing of borders, some governments have gone further and have launched a campaign against the press and freedom of expression. Between one and another series of preventive measures they want to impose a bitter censorship and curtail of civic rights. Along with the quarantine and the masks, punishments and gags spread everywhere.

We have seen everything. From leaders and rulers who incite xenophobic hatreds and use the pandemic politically, to others who promote mass mobilizations despite the risk and minimize scientific recommendations. While many politicians insist they are combating dangerous hoaxes against health, they actually plunge the knife in an attempt to destroy their critics, who question their management and the media that challenges them. continue reading

In times of epidemic, independent reporters in Cuba receive more police citations than usual, and Internet users who report official errors are threatened with exemplary punishment. A shower of interrogations and fines has fallen on the press not controlled by the Communist Party and it is expected that these retaliations will increase as the number of cases positive Covid-19 also increase.

Along with interrogations by the political police, confiscations of work supplies and monetary penalties, the new wave of repression includes demonization campaigns against the private media, presenting these reporters as almost another type of coronavirus. Authorities seem especially interested in cutting off any narrative about the harsh reality of long lines, shortages, and economic uncertainty that have flared in recent days.

The official attacks are also characterized by amnesia. When, a few weeks ago social networks were filled with exhortations for classes to be canceled and borders closed to tourism, government spokespeople branded citizen proposals as manipulations coming from abroad. Days later, the Plaza of the Revolution imposed a package of measures very similar to the one it repudiated.

The delay of those weeks, in which official tourist campaigns continued promoting the Island as “a safe destination” and even hinted that the high temperatures of the Caribbean were an additional protection against contagion, was widely denounced in the independent media. The cost in lives of that delay is something we will never know with certainty.

Now, intolerance has escalated a step further, and a young journalist was summoned by police last week and given a hefty fine. Mónica Baró, winner of the Gabo Prize in the Text 2019 category, received threats for her posts on Facebook. According to the repressors, her crime is having disseminated “information contrary to the social interest, morality, good customs and integrity of people”, according to the draconian Decree Law 370 that regulates the distribution of content.

Sheltered through the coronavirus, other dangerous pathogens thrive, ones that – wearing a necktie or military epaulets – want to leave society without “information defenses.”

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This text was originally published by Deustche Welle’s Latin America page.

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.

Lies and Half-truths about a Donation from China to Cuba to Fight Coronavirus

Cuban authorities knew as far back as last November that Avianca was not reliable for travel to Cuba. (EFE)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Katia Monteagudo/Mayli Estévez, México/Madrid, April 14th, 2020 — On the first day of April, the official daily of the Communist Party of Cuba, Granma, published an article entitled “The Untold Story of How an Airplane with Medical Supplies from Cuba was unable to enter Cuba”.

The source of the information was the Cuban embassador in China, Carlos Miguel Pereira Hernández. Granma reproduced a text published by Pereira Hernández which asserted — without any evidence whatsoever — that the foundation of Chinese billionaire Jack Ma, founder of the online store Alibaba, wanted to send medical supplies to Cuba to combat the coronavirus epidemic, but was unable to do so because of the embargo laws of the United States.

“The carrier [for the Jack Ma Foundation], a U.S. company that was hired, declined the job at the last minute, citing the rules of the economic, commercial and financial blockade in force against the recipient nation, reimposed by the present administration in the USA,” wrote the embassador in a blog reproduced by Granma. continue reading

Later, Pereira stated: “The extraordinarily noble and laudable attempt by the founder of Alibaba and the Jack Ma Foundation (…) could not touch down on Cuban soil, no matter how necessary these resources could be in sustaining the battle waged by the besieged and blockaded small Caribbean island.

The story was reproduced literally by other media and the matter was settled — one of the richest men in China wanted to support the fight against the pandemic but, at the last minute, the carrier did not want to go to Cuba.

The government, by way of Granma, left several questions unanswered, however, among these a very fundamental one — why is it, given there are several options for sending the goods, that the outfit that had been refused to fly to Cuba months ago was precisely the one chosen?

This is a retelling of the complete story.

What did the donation consist of?

Jack Ma is the founder of Alibaba, one of the biggest internet sales outlets in the world, and competitor to the US company Amazon. Ma has a foundation which on the twenty-first of March announced on Twitter that it would send two million masks, 400,000 virus detection tests and 104 mechanical respirators to Latin American countries.

And how was the donation to get there?

The logistic arm in charge of shipping products of the Alibaba group is the Cainiao company which has its own freight planes. In order to have its donations arrive as quickly as possible, Cainiao partnered with about 50 partners in transportation and logistics which, until now, have delivered more than 100 million vital medical supplies to more than 140 countries in Latin America and the rest of the world.

In Africa, for example, they operate with Ethiopian Airlines; in Europe, with ASL Airlinnes, which is of Irish origin, while the state-run China Cargo supplied shipments to the Ma Foundation in Spain.

In Latin America, Alibaba has used various airlines for shipments. For example, in Mexico on March 31st, they used the Mexican freight airline AeroUnión. Said airline, in point of fact, does fly charters to Havana.

Any one of the airlines mentioned could have shipped the donation to Cuba. Yet, in order to fly to the Island and to other countries of the region such as Panama, Bolivia or Colombia, Caimiao chose Avianca, as was reported by the news agency AP.

It is not known how or why the decision was made, nor whether the Cuban authorities in Beijing knew of it in advance and could have prevented the outcome. But in choosing Avianca, the Chinese donor committed a mistake because Avianca was unable to complete the mission.

We inquired of Alibaba and the Jack Ma Foundation regarding this decision, but as of the moment of publication, they haven’t answered the several emails they have been sent.

Is it really true that “a US firm refused the job at the last minute”, as the embassador has said?

This is false.

Avianca isn’t exactly an enterprise with its headquarters in the US. Its headquarters is in Colombia, and it’s an airline whose share holders are principally Colombians and Salvadorans. As of last year, these owners have been controlling the shares of Avianca through a network of corporations registered in the state of Delaware, USA.

This in fact caused Avianca to cease selling tickets last year for Cuba from Colombia and El Salvador. The airline announced on October 31, 2019, that it would not fly into Cuba while it was resolving with the US authorities certain questions related to the embargo. Subsequently, on November 20th, Avianca confirmed that as of January of the present year it would not operate flights into Cuba.

So, this was a cancellation at last minute? Hardly! The Cuban authorities knew from last November that Avianca, having become a company partly regulated by laws of the United States as a corporation operating in Delaware, was not reliable for flying into Cuba.

Have other donations suffered the same obstacle?

No.

On April 6th, Chancellor Bruno Rodríguez announced that “a donation sent by the People’s Republic of China has arrived.” According to Xinhua, the Chinese state news agency, the cargo included 2,000 N95 masks, 10,000 surgical masks, 2,000 protective gowns, and an equal number of pairs of sanitary shoes, protective goggles, and gloves.

Another donation, from a Chinese company called Zhengzhou Yutong Bus, donated 100,000 protective masks and 10,000 protective gowns, according to Xinhua.

How did these goods arrive at the Island? As the deadline for press approaches, we have been unable to verify independently the route of entry, but it is sure we can be sure that they indeed arrived to the Island because a more reliable carrier than Avianca was hired.

Other donations by the founder of Alibaba to countries under embargo also have arrived at their destinations. In a tweet from the Jack Ma Foundation on March 13, assurance was made that in previous weeks countries such as Iran (likewise sanctioned by the United States) had received medical shipments from the Chinese company.

The Government of Iran, for its part, expressed its gratitude. A spokesman for the Foreign Ministry at Teheran declared that “the Iranians shall never forget their friends in hard times,” at the same time they confirmed that the material had been received the past 14th of March, along with medical equipment and financial aid coming also out of Azerbaijan, United Arab Emirates, China, Japan, Qatar, Russia and Turkey.

How could they have done it? They selected the proper airline to transport the goods.

Does the embargo really prohibit US companies from sending humanitarian donations to Cuba?

The laws governing the US blockade of Cuba are considered overly hard and illegal by many countries of the world, but they have their exceptions. Among these is the shipment of donations. In article 746.2 of the embargo law, it is expressly affirmed that no american company needs an advance authorization in order to make humanitarian donations to Cuba. Article 740.12 specifies that the only such [blockaded materials] would be medical goods that could be used for torture or human rights violations, or cases in which there is certainty that they will be resold to other countries or used for the production of “biotechnological” material.

So, why didn’t Avianca transport the goods?

Upon being consulted for this story, Avianca referred us to its public relations statements and would not give any further explanations. There is, ipso facto, no accurate response.

What could have happened is that the airlines might have feared being brought to trial in the United States by a man named Ramón López Regueiro, who already has sued another airline for operating in Cuba this past September.

López Regueiro, a US citizen, avers that the José Martí International Airport belongs to him because his father had the license to build and operate it during the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista. The facilities were expropriated afterwards by the Revolution.

At present, there is a United States law in effect that allows lawsuits in that country against any company in the world that knowingly benefits from or uses in any form private goods expropriated during the Cuban Revolution.

This rule, in the third section of the referenced Helms Burton Law, though passed in 1996, never was set in effect because it was considered too vague and extreme. This past year, however, the administration of Donald Trump decided it should be applied.

From that time on, it has given rise to lawsuits such as those of López Regueiro. He considers that whatever airline that operates in Cuba is benefitting from an asset that was expropriated from him without any compensation for his family.

For this reason, he brought suit against American Airlines and the Chilean Latam Airlines, and warned others that he might sue them as well.

Though this risk has not kept plenty of airlines from flying to Havana, it’s possible that it dissuaded Avianca.

Lorenzo Palomares Starbuck, a Florida lawyer who defends the strict application of the Helms Burton Law, confirmed in an interview that “no carrier can arrive at a port that has been confiscated by the Castro Government.”

“It will be very difficult in these times for a US airline or one with a [US] capital investment such as Avianca to carry donations to Cuba,” stated Palomares Starbuck.

This opinion, nevertheless, is not shared unanimously by the courts of the United States. Other Cuban-american heirs of expropriated assets have not managed to succeed in similar suits before the courts.

In January of this year, Granma reported, a judge in Miami threw out a suit against various cruise companies that used land in the port of Havana that had been expropriated by the Revolution.

*Katia Monteagudo is a Cuban journalist who has written for various media, among them Yahoo News and the magazine El Estornudo (The Sneeze). Mayli Estévez likewise is a Cuban journalist who collaborates with Tremenda Nota (“Great High” or “Good Buzz”) and Play Off Magazine.

Translated by: Pedro Antonio Gallet Gobin

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Argentine Tourists Have Been Relocated to the Habana Libre and the Neptune-Triton Hotels

The Tulipán Hotel now is destined for Cuban health care workers who take part in international missions. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, April 21, 2020 – Some of the Argentine tourists who put up in the Tulipán Hotel in the Capital have, as of this Sunday, a new residence at the Tryp Habana Libre, if they can pay between 30 and 40 dollars US for a room, a price very much below the usual rate of 145 dollars.

If this is not possible, the travelers must declare themselves indigent and fill out a sworn statement in order to be transferred to the Hotel Neptuno-Tritón, in which case the Argentine government itself will assume the costs.

Until the end of this past week, the Tulipán sheltered a group of 195 sojourners from the South American country who found themselves stranded in the Island with the closing of air space of both nations, but the authorities have proceeded with the emptying-out and disinfecting of the hotel for its incorporation into the National Health System. continue reading

“We were told they were sending doctors from the brigades that are being sent abroad so that they could stay a few days before traveling. I understood it was a sort of quarantine,” a worker at the Hotel Tulipán reported to our paper. “Here we disinfected over the weekend and already are ready to receive them.”

During recent weeks it came to be somewhat usual to see the Argentine group in the areas of greenery around the establishment where they spent the hours doing exercises or playing soccer.

In an interview with Notícias around the end of March, Javier Figueroa, Argentine ambassador to Cuba, counted about 900 of his countrymen who found themselves trapped on the Island. “We are looking into special flights. The entry is forbidden, but not the exit from the Island,” he said.

The Embassy has announced the departure of a flight of Copa airlines for this Thursday. It’s the fourth chartered airplane for Argentines leaving Cuba, but there yet remain at least 400 more persons, an employee of the Embassy in Havana told 14ymedio.

The departure criteria the authorities have put together favor persons with greater clinical or epidemiological risk. “We know […] that there are people on medication and who have pathologies that put them at risk. These will be the absolute priority.”

The Argentine embassy has been providing information via its social media in which it has received various criticisms and complaints of families concerned about the slowness of the operation. The delegation defended itself, affirming that half already have been repatriated and the remainder were being “sheltered with food and all the medicines that can be had.”

Others have objected over these transfers which they consider to represent lack of prevention, in the context of present circumstances. “I’m in Cuba, my children are there in Cuba. They travelled well before the quarantine and are marooned there by necessity, under force majeure, due to the pandemic. They are workers who can’t afford to pay what you all propose […] it’s an obligation to care for and protect all of them and not to commit such a foul-up.”

The ambassador has rejected the criticisms and updated the situation of the Argentines who still are on the Island. “I am not going to accept talking about a ‘foul-up’. The State has evacuated 650 persons; another 156 are leaving this Thursday. No one is in the street. No one has been infected. No one has had a medical emergency, nor has been admitted to a hospital.”

Translated by: Pedro Antonio Gallet Gobin

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Blackouts in Sight in the Midst of COVID19

A blackout in the city of Camagüey. (14ymedio)

14ymedio biggerElias Amor Bravo, Economist, April 20, 2020 — Unión Nacional Eléctrica, the state enterprise that has a monopoly over Cuba’s electrical supply, wants people isolated in their homes due to the quarantine as a consequence of COVID 19 to consume less electricity. Let’s go, turn off the lights.

The company declared in the state-run newspaper Granma that there has been an uptick in electrical consumption in the residential sector and that’s inadmissable. They declared, “the consumption of electrical energy accumulated in the first 13 days of April surpassed the levels of consumption compared to the same period last year (1% more and 6.3 Gigawatt hours (gwh)), similar to the electricity consumed in the months of July and August.”

The immediate question is, is there a reason for alarm with this small increase in consumption? Do they lack solutions to this problem?

Well, no. It appears that the entire system may collapse. continue reading

And here’s the worst part. Threats of this caliber, published in the official Communist newspaper daily, don’t do anything more than to raise the anxiety of a society worried by COVID19 and the destruction it could cause on human life.

In any other country in the world, exceptional circumstances like the one we’re living in demand answers in accord with government agencies. But, here there is an electric company that, according to the Communist constitution, is public property, insisting on threatening blackouts if energy is not saved as soon as possible. Nobody can deny that quarantine requires a greater amount of energy consumption to store food products in the refrigerator, to beat the heat, to be able to read and pass the time more comfortably, to work remotely (those who can), and so on.

Why does the least powerful sector, the people confined to their houses, have to reduce their electricity consumption? The same as usual. The production of electricity in Cuba depends on petroleum. There are no renewable energy sources and they’re not on the way.

As a consequence of the fuel shortage, due in part to the systematic reduction of supply from Venezuela, and the difficulties Cuba has in gaining access to global markets due to its nonexistent financial standing, the only solution is to save, save, and continue to save. Sure, turn everything off. Because the alternative is clear, blackouts. And while everyone is locked in at home, in a moment especially complicated like this one, this approaches a Dantesque situation.

COVID19 is bringing to light, one by one, how the measures taken by the communist regime the last few years have been resolute failures. Now it’s the energy plan’s turn. The image of change and liberalization that the communist propaganda machine has wanted to associate with Raul Castro’s reforms is smoke and mirrors. It evaporates while COVID19 wreaks havoc.

The Cuban economy is worse off than in 2008, the reforms have not improved anything, and Cubans have barely experienced and well-being in their standard of living. The Plan 2030 is not worth anything either, the way things are changing and the pace at which they change.

In the meantime, and waiting for all this to happen, the communists are doing the same as usual: sending people home so that the productive sector can reduce electricity consumption. Paralyzing or freezing the economy here matters little, because everything is state-run.

And then, of course, a lot of control or something like that. Precise instructions to the heads of administration to carry out with the utmost responsibility controlled compliance with their energy plans, “by taking daily self-readings of the meters and measures to reduce consumption, depending on the authorized energy-consumption measures.” Instead of concentrating efforts on producing more with less, they create daily scandals about electricity consumption. And then they wonder why the economy doesn’t work.

The last straw is transferring the need to save electricity to Cuban families, under the threat of impending blackouts. This communist blackmail is inadmissible in any society with recognized economic rights, even more so when the current system does not allow for alternative suppliers and everyone must pay their rates to the National Electric Union. It’s the same as with ETECSA — the state telecommunications monopoly — but at least that company works a little better.

Some of the actions that have been established belong to the barracks logic of the communist economy that has presided over Cuba for the past 61 years, such as, for example, “taking advantage of the final heat of the electric stove, once the cooking is finished, and turning it off a few minutes before finishing.” Or even, “turning on the air conditioning, preferably after 10 at night. After 12:00 at night, turn the air conditioner to the fan position” and even “close the refrigerator and avoid opening it frequently,” and others that tell people how to live. It’s unacceptable.

And best of all is the example they cite to save no less than 26 tons of diesel fuel used to produce electricity. Well, according to Granma, that saving, which is certainly important, is achieved “if each consumer in the national territory turns off a 20 watt lamp, which will allow for a decrease in the demand for electricity by 80 megawatts.” 11 million Cubans turning off 20 watt lamps? The truth is that they no longer know what to say. Above all, to justify the unjustifiable.

 Translated by: Rafael Osorio

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Day 32 of the Covid-19 Emergency in Cuba: Engineers Without Diplomas

Just when the “camouflage” of the mask could help us independent reporters the most, is when it is useless. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez, Havana, 21 April 2020 — This Tuesday was complicated from the beginning. A pipe in our apartment broke and with all the plumbers in quarantine we had to appeal to our knowledge as engineers-without-diplomas to resolve the problem. Reinaldo managed to patch the break with the old trick of a plastic bag, but it remains to wait until this afternoon when they turn the water on in the building to see if the patch holds up.

No sooner was the plumbing work done than a distressed friend called because he’s been out of work for a month. Our phone rings constantly. They call from the prisons, the hospitals, and from distant villages we didn’t even know existed. Some want to report an event, others to say hello, and many tell of their anguish. Thus we live in a physical space shared between a home, a newsroom and a psychotherapy practice.

My friend is an employee of a state workplace that was closed after the  Covid-19 arrived on the Island. Right now he is receiving his full salary for at least the first four weeks. Put like this it seems like a panacea: stay home with his family and collect his wages. The problem is that, like many Cubans, the family’s main sustenance is what he gets “under the table” on his job. So in a few days his real (not official) earnings have plummeted. continue reading

Like him, thousands of people who inhabit this Island have been hanging on by their fingernails: the cook who supplements his meager salary with the cheese taken from the hotel that he then offers on the black market; the school librarian who sells her homemade peanut nougat to high school students; and the custodian of a company warehouse that makes ends meet by sneaking out a tub of ice cream every week.

In this “country of diversion of resources,” the closure of a large number of workplaces abruptly cuts the invisible salary that supports many families. It is an undeclared but crucial economic element. Hence my friend’s feeling of being asphyxiated is so understandable.

After taking other calls and before noon we had to go to “report the liberated-rationed chicken,” the bureaucratic way of saying we didn’t get the product and now we need to be on a list for the next time I go back to the butcher’s. For three days we were in doubt as to whether or not to wait in the long line to buy it, but we opted for our health and lost the chicken. Now we will have to wait.

Our residence address, ration card number, full name with two surnames and other information from the family nucleus were all necessary to fill out the claim form. The local employee had to dedicate so many minutes to our case that there was some discomfort among those who were waiting to buy the soy yogurt that they sell to those over 65. “It looks like you are going to buy a car instead of reporting a chicken,” a neighbor complained.

But with neither car nor chicken, the rest of the journey to look for food was on foot. On the way I greeted several people, but I’m not sure if I knew them because the masks make identification difficult.

This virus has also stolen our faces. Something that has its advantages. One could combine wigs with the masks to evade the political police, if it weren’t for there being nowhere to go, no public activity to report on in our newspaper, nor any clandestine gatherings to attend. Just when “camouflage” could help independent reporters the most, is when it is useless.

This time, at the nearby agricultural market, I got fresh ginger and carrots. Something is something and the products that are appearing bit by bit on the neighborhood stands also force me to explore new combinations. So as soon as I returned from the street’s strenuous heat and its dangers of contagion, I grated a piece of that root, added aloe vera from the garden and prepared a smoothie. I took a long drink… to the health of the future.

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Day 31 of the Covid-19 Emergency in Cuba: Guesser, Seer

For many Cubans, the days are now divided into waiting, surviving, searching for food and listening to news. (EFE / Ernesto Mastrascusa)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez, Havana, 20 April 2020 you’re — Time is deformed in quarantine. It seems like an eternity has passed since the first case of Covid-19 was reported in Cuba, and yet, it was just a few weeks ago that they announced on official television that three travelers had symptoms when they arrived on the island. Since then, the days have taken another structure and prolonged their duration. For many, the days are now divided into waiting, surviving, searching for food and listening to news.

From the time I wake up, I try to prevent the pandemic from molding my existence and dictating my routine, but it is difficult. The hours of work have increased and many of the activities that allowed me relax after the stress of a Newsroom no longer exist or cannot be done. Not visiting friends, nor escaping to the wall along the Malecon, much less inviting colleagues to share some good movies from the ‘weekly packet.’

Today I prepared my bag and went out to explore the neighborhood to buy food. In the market that we used to call “the land of the rich” – for its higher prices – there were only some tomatoes that looked like they had been thrown from a truck. The store, located on Tulipán Street and once the commercial epicenter of the area, fell out of favor years ago when restrictions on intermediaries and the appearance of another state market suffocated it. continue reading

From the flies and the rotten smell I knew that I would have to discard part of what I bought, but it was worth the risk because for days there have been no tomatoes on any market stand nearby. “It doesn’t matter if they are crushed, that makes my puree a little earlier,” I said optimistically to myself and paid for two pounds. I followed the same street and crossed to a nearby store, but the line of more than 50 people made me give up.

I turned back and ended up on the train line. A few meters away, at the door of a small store, only three people were waiting to be attended. My lucky day, I thought. I marked my place in line and took the opportunity to check my mobile and make a couple of calls. Finally it was my turn. A counter blocked customers, but the interior shelves with the merchandise were not visible from the outside. “What are you going to buy?” asked the woman.

The coronavirus has not only twisted time but also seems to have added several new distortions to the Cuban absurdity. “What do you have for sale?” I replied, but the employee was indefatigable: “You have to tell me what you are looking for and I will tell you if there is any.” An incredible exercise. Now I was going to have to list all the foods I could think of to see – if by chance or luck – they were left in that store.

I took a deep breath and started: Chicken? No, there isn’t any. Sausages? We haven’t had any for a long time. Oil? It’s gone. Sardines? No. The entire glossary of products that I have ever seen sold in Cuban stores began to parade through my mouth. Butter? Girl, just a memory. Milk? Until last week we had evaporated. Cookies? Nothing at all. When I was already thinking that this was a colossal joke, it occurred to me to say honey? and the smiling employee answered me with another question “Which one do you want from the little one or the big one?”

“Big one, of course,” I almost screamed. “If every time I need something I have to run through this list, my mask is going to wear out,” I couldn’t stop adding sarcastically. So I bought that half-liter bottle of nationally produced honey. I went home, checked the news, watered the plants in our home garden, and rescued one of my shoes from the mouth of the new dog for the umpteenth time.

On a break from work I had some of the peanuts I roasted yesterday with some of the honey from this morning . I enjoyed looking at Havana from the balcony on the 14th floor. Tomorrow will be another day. Time and absurdity will expand and contract capriciously again.

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"Cuban Interferon is a False Hope" for Coronavirus

Cuba has given more than 8,000 doses of interferon to the regime in Nicaragua. (Confidencial)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Wilfredo Miranda Aburto, Managua, April 14, 2020 — A Venezuelan flight, Conviasa, coming from Cuba, landed last Wednesday in Managua. The aircraft brought 8,000 doses of Interferon Alpha-2B, a pharmaceutical with which the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosadio Murilla “will combat the coronavirus.” Since Covid-19 arrived in Nicaragua, the Sandinista Government has praised the Cuban medicine as a panacea.

The hepatologist, Edward Mena, who has spent years working with this medication in the United States, learned of the official response plan, and his reaction was not positive. “Interferon isn’t going to help anything,” he warns.

Mena is one of the most respected medical specialists in the hepatic field. He is Nicaraguan but received his professional training in California. He is the Director of the Pasadena Liver Center and the California Liver Research Institute, where he has been able to study the use of interferon in several hepatic illnesses. continue reading

Since the spread of COVID-19, regimes with close ties to Cuba have promoted the idea that the medication commercialized by Cuba helped to stop the epidemic in China. In fact, the Sandinista government spread the idea among its sympathizers that “interferon is the cure for coronavirus.”

However, Dr. Mena’s medical practice contradicts this idea. “Up to now, there has never been a study showing that interferon helps with this type of virus. In this family of viruses, COVID-19 is new, but not that new. There have been similar virus types, like SARS in 2003 and MERS in 2011, and interferon has never cured them,” said the specialist.

In an interview with Confidencial, Dr. Mena said there isn’t any proof that interferon stopped the spread of COVID-19 in China, because other medications were also used. He explained that up to now, no pharmaceutical has been able to destroy the coronavirus, but interferon does cause harmful side effects. He described it by saying “It’s like having chemotherapy.”

Before the uncertainty of the medical world, which is hurrying to find a cure for coronavirus, Doctor Mena prescribes a cure that up to now has proven to be the most effective way to stop the contagion: social distancing, quarantine and isolation. This what he said:

Question: The Government of Nicaragua has announced that Cuba has given it more than 8,000 doses of Interferon Alpha-2B to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic. Can this medication help arrest coronavirus, taking into account that there is still no vaccine?

Answer: In my opinion, interferon won’t help anything. I have used Interferon Alpha-2A and 2B for hepatitis B and hepatitis C and have never seen good results. Now, typically when we use interferon, we use it with another medicine called ribavirin, and the two medicines are used to treat viruses. Interferon alone is not going to work. The other problem we have with interferon is when do we start treatment? Do we start it when there is contact with someone? When someone has symptoms? Or when someone is very ill? My opinion is that if interferon is used when someone is very ill, more harm is done. My professional opinion, with decades of using interferon, is that it doesn’t help anything.

Q: If interferon is used for hepatitis, what other type of illnesses can it help? What are its advantages and disadvantages?

A. With hepatitis B and C, in my experience, we use interferon for one year to kill the hepatitis C virus, and we have only a 40% chance of killing it. With hepatitis B, after one year, the probability of killing the virus is 10%. We use interferon for certain types of cancer and blood problems, and, again, the effectiveness of interferon is not very good.

Q. Is there clinical proof that interferon can help to stop the coronavirus?

A. No. Up to now there hasn’t been any study that says that interferon helps in curing this type of virus. COVID-19 is new, but not that new. There have been other similar viruses like SARS in 2003, MERS in 2001, and interferon has never been able to cure these viruses.

Q. Does interferon have side effects for patients?

A. It’s a horrible medication. The side effects are like you are in chemotherapy. Patients have nausea, vomiting, body aches, anemia; it decreases their platelets, their white blood cells. It’s a very harsh and difficult treatment. There are many side effects.

Q. Many Nicaraguans think it’s a kind of vaccine against the coronavirus. What do you say when a government implies this type of thing?

A. They’re giving people false hope. I don’t think it helps. Interferon does more harm than good. As I said, the side effects are horrible and the benefit is zero.

Q. The U.S. has now become the country with the most cases of COVID-19 in the world. What medications are used there to treat coronavirus?

A. We don’t have treatments for coronavirus. The best treatment is keeping a social distance of two meters [six feet], quarantine and isolation. All the medicines we use are in the research phase. The first is hydroxychloriquine; the second is a medicine called remdesivir, made by Gilead Science; and the third is opinavir/ritonavir, which is used for AIDS. All are medicines under investigation. It’s too soon to say which one will work and which one won’t.

Q. In Nicaragua, the government has not ordered social isolation and also is promoting gatherings. As a specialist, what do you think?

A. It’s horrible, because if you don’t have isolation, social distancing and quarantine, half of the country will be infected, and there will be people dying in the streets.

Q. In Nicaragua, health personnel have denounced the order forbidding them from using personal protection equipment, like masks, because it supposedly creates alarm among the patients. What is the risk for those who are on the first line of defense against the virus?

A. It’s a terrible order. What’s going to happen is that they’re going to infect more patients. It’s important to use protective equipment to protect doctors and nurses who are on the front lines. If they don’t have masks, they’re going to catch the virus and spread it. This will make the situation worse. Not giving them protection will create harm, and this has to be done now.

Q. What message would you give to the Ministry of Health in Nicaragua in the face of this pandemic?

A. The most important thing for the pandemic is to take it seriously. This virus kills people. You must have testing, social distancing, quarantine and masks to protect the population. If you don’t, 50% of patients will die. Nicaragua is six weeks behind the rest of the world. The effects that we are seeing in the rest of the world, like the U.S. and Italy, we will see in Nicaragua in six weeks. They can’t conceal the number of deaths. When there are deaths from pneumonia, they will be related to the virus. There is no other explanation.

Note: This interview is reprinted with permission from Confidencial, an online Nicaraguan source, which also experiences censorship in its own country.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cubans Dread the Return of Lengthy Blackouts

Officials have not given details of the quantity of fuel no longer being consumed due to the closing of industries, the paralysis of education and the shutting down of public transportation. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, April 19th, 2020 — Cubans fear that added to the Covid-19 crisis on the Island will be electrical black-outs due to exhaustion of fuel supply, a concern that has increased this week when the authorities made an appeal to save energy on account of the increased consumption due to confinement and the elevated temperatures.

Those who recall the crisis of the ’90s, officially known as the “Special Period“, fear a short-term repetition of the scarcity of foodstuffs, collapse of transportation, and blackouts which characterized those years following the loss of Soviet subsidies.

Months before the first case of coronavirus contagion in Cuba, the scarcity of fuel had caused a decrease in public transportation and of the workday in many state offices, as well as in the supply to gasoline stations. continue reading

Faced with an “uncommon increase of demand and consumption” which went so far as to surpass the high average consumption of summer months, the National Office for the Control of Reasonable Use of Energy launched a “Save Now!” campaign.

With the majority of families in seclusion and classes suspended, the use of air conditioners, fans and appliances has shot up in Cuban households. The situation was made worse this past April 12th when a new national temperature record of 39.7C (103.5F) was recorded.

Sixty-eight percent of this demand is concentrated in households, according to data from the National Energy Council. In Havana alone, residential sector use rose from 55% to 80%, as the General Director of Eléctrica de la Habana, Mario Castillo, explained to the newspaper Tribuna.

During the first fortnight of April, the average maximum demand at noon (11 a.m. to 1 p.m.) rose 20.6%; 421 Megawatts above the expected according to official sources cited by the state news agency Agencia Cubana de Notícias.

“All this high consumption causes damages that are perfectly avoidable if the population pays heed to the effectiveness of using energy in a reasonable manner,” insists the Director of the electric company Empresa Eléctrica de la Habana.

Nonetheless, the officials have not given details as to how much fuel use has been reduced with the closing of industries, the suspension of classes and the shutting down of public transportation, measures undertaken to face down the coronavirus.

These worries have shot up the demand for candles, matches and fuel to light oil lamps, but the task of latching on to these products is arduous in a country where the greater part of products are rationed, and others are sold on the black market because of the exhaustion of supplies in stores.

In the Twitter social medium, a number of users have reported electrical outages this past week, and have reactivated the hashtag #ReportoApagonCuba in order to report the situation. This hashtag was greatly popularized around the middle of this past year when a series of cash flow crises that required the cutting back of imports was noticed. Cuba’s principal ally and benefactor, the Venezuelan government led by Nicolás Maduro, had to confront its own internal crisis, for which it reduced substantially the shipments of petroleum to the Island.

With less money to buy petroleum at international market prices, and without the Venezuelan subsidy, the authorities perform juggling acts in order to avoid having the Island regress to the years in which blackouts lasted twelve hours.

 Translated by: Pedro Antonio Gallet Gobin

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Days 27 to 30 of the Covid-19 Crisis in Cuba: Silencing the Critics with Fines

The fines for publishing criticisms on social networks or questioning the government’s management of the crisis have been swift. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez, Havana, 19 April 2020 – The days now are defined by lines and heat. The temperatures stop any breezes from blowing on our 14th floor, midday feels like an oven, and the fans have to work much harder than normal for April. But the lines to buy food are the worst because, in addition to suffering the heat while waiting, there is the danger of contracting Covid-19.

Three days ago “liberated-rationed” chicken arrived at the butcher shop on the ground floor of my building, one of those numerous euphemisms in the official language that is translated to mean until recently it was a product that could be bought without restrictions at the shoppings*, but it is now offered through the rationing system, at the price of 20 Cuban pesos (CUP) per pound.

Although the price equals the daily salary of a professional, there is a very long line to buy. After three days waiting for the line to settle down, Sunday arrived and we still haven’t been able to buy some. However, we did manage to get two pounds of peanuts that I will roast and they will be very helpful for the next few days. continue reading

I have a special affection for peanuts. In addition to being a food that is tasty, versatile and very beneficial for health, Cubans owe a lot to this legume, especially during the tough years of the crisis of the 90s. Rebaptized “Cuban gum” for its popularity, it has accompanied us for decades on long walks, schools in the countryside, and afternoons after returning home.

A starring product of the black market, peanuts managed to survive the nationalization that was imposed in Cuba after the infamous Revolutionary Offensive of 1968, in which even the shoeshine boxes were nationalized. The little paper cone with salty nuts, or sugary nougat or the subsequent recipe for pralines helped me to ease burning hunger pangs many times during my childhood and adolescence.

So when Reinaldo showed up with two pounds of peanuts that he managed to buy this Saturday in the nearby Youth Labor Army market on Tulipán Street, I had to smile and I thought, “Here comes San Peanut again, to save us.” After we roast it, we will use it for breakfast and perhaps add it to some salads as well, or, if luck smiles on me and I also find basil, I will make pesto.

With this, I am no longer going to risk the line for the chicken, which I tried to take a photo of a couple of days ago, but a man appeared saying that it was prohibited and that he would call the police. Along with the Covid-19, which as of yesterday had claimed 34 lives in Cuba — according to official data — another victim of this pandemic has been the little freedom of expression that we had managed to conquer by force of exercising it.

The Powers-That-Be are taking advantage of the emergency to further increase censorship. The fines for publishing criticisms on social networks or questioning the government’s management of the crisis have become an instrument to silence independent journalists, who are cited to meet with the political police in order to intimidate them.

It is expected that as the number of infected people grows and the economic crisis worsens, the authorities will cut even more citizens’ freedoms. The independent press is, undoubtedly, at the center of these intentions. As if the masks that now populate our streets should also act as gags. The mouth sealed, both literally and metaphorically.

So in addition to the lines, the heat and the coronavirus we will have to deal with an increase in repression. In the face of this even stricter slashing of freedoms, fans, rationed-liberated chicken and roasted peanuts are totally useless, the only thing that works is denunciation and acting like a free person.

*Translator’s note: Cubans use the English word to refer to the large commercial establishments.

See other posts in this series.

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USA Reiterates That Sanctions Against Cuba Do Not Apply to Humanitarian Aid

USA has reminded that health and humanitarian exchange has never been prohibited by the embargo nor is it now with COVID-19.

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 17 April 2020 — In answer to the Cuban government’s insistent campaign for the United States to lift the embargo during the coronavirus epidemic, on Thursday Washington reminded that the exceptions provided for humanitarian aid remain in force.

“The embargo . . . is aimed at the Cuban communist regime, that for decades has oppressed the Cuban people and has not managed to meet its most basic needs.  Although the embargo . . . continues in force, and most transactions between the United States, or people subject to to its jurisdiction, and Cuba continue to be prohibited, the OFAC [Office of Foreign Assets Control] maintains several general license authorizations designed to permit humnaitarian aid and assistance to the Cuban people,” says the text.

The USA has issued this message specifically with regards to its sanctions of the Island and also other countries, like North Korea, Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Ukraine, and Russia.  It urges these countries to take advantage of the exceptions for humanitarian aid and ask for help. continue reading

In the case of Cuba, it notes that transactions related to medicines, medical devices, and agricultural products are permitted in certain conditions.  It is also possible to transport authorized cargo with travellers from the USA to the Island or to send remittances to relatives and NGOs.

The Treasury also maintains the authorization to share transport services by boat or plane related to permitted trips that, it notes, are related to humanitarian projects (among them health or emergencies) or linked to independent civil society groups, as well as the preservation of historical heritage or the environment.

Another of the exemptions affects products or services that allow development of infrastructure or loans that “directly benefit the people,” like those related to public transportation, water and waste management, the production and distribution of electricity; as well as hospitals, homes, or schools

Cuba’s Ministry of Foreign Relations made a public statement in which it accuses the USA of persisting in a blockade that imposes on Cuba “an extraordinary pressure to guarantee the material supplies and equipment that sustain the public health system and specific conditions in order to stop this pandemic.”  In this sense the message makes reference to the delivery from China that could not arrive at the Island due to the refusal of Avianca to fly to Cuba.

The message also denounces Washington for trying to impede, they assert, Cuba from sending doctors to support other countries’ health systems that desire it.  “Instead of dedicating itself to promoting cooperation and stimulation of a joint response, high officials of the State Department of that country spend their time making threatening statements against those governments that, in the face of the drama of the pandemic, opt sovereignly to seek help from Cuba.  The United States commits a crime and their officials know it when, attacking the international cooperation that Cuba offers in the middle of a pandemic, it proposes to deprive millions of people of the universal human right to health services.”

In the extensive text, Havana also makes reference to the universality of the virus and demands by poorer countries for help from international organizations like the World Health Organization (WHO), so that economic inequality may not mean an increase in lethality.  The petition coincides with the announcement by Donald Trump of the withdrawal of funds to the UN’s health division, a decision heavily criticized by the European Union, the African Union, China, and Russia, because of the repercussions that it might have for poor countries during the pandemic.

Although exports of medical equipment from the USA to Cuba decreased in the last year, exceeding a little more than a million dollars as compared with 3,492,000 in 2018, those related to food continued to rise despite the embargo.

Exports of these products increased by 14% in 2019, according to a report by the United States-Cuba Trade and Economic Council (Cuba Trade) and trade in general rose to 257.6 million dollars last year, as compared with 224.9 million in 2018.

Translated by Mary Lou Keel 

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