Cuban authorities report that the number of infections is beginning to be controlled, but in just three weeks the number of cases has soared
14ymedio, Madrid, November 12, 2025 — Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez spoke words that were as feared as they were expected on Tuesday. “We are going to handle this epidemic like we did with Covid-19,” he said at the meeting of health experts, who analyzed the situation created since viruses associated with arbovirosis began to spread on the island. The population has assumed for weeks that the spread is rampant and expected the authorities to do the same, although they fear that the mention of coronavirus will cause more worry.
The authorities spoke yesterday of an “unspecific febrile syndrome,” as it is known in medicine: a condition characterized by the presence of high fever and commonly associated with a wide variety of diseases such as dengue, zika, chikungunya and many others. According to the data offered by Public Health at the meeting, it is the second consecutive week that the number of infections has decreased, but the accumulation of cases is frightening.
Dr. José Raúl de Armas Fernández said that there are eight provinces in which the number is beginning to fall — Havana, Matanzas, Villa Clara, Cienfuegos, Ciego de Ávila, Granma, Santiago de Cuba and Guantánamo — from which it can be inferred that the others have at least stable, if not increased, numbers. Sancti Spíritus, according to an article published this Wednesday in the newspaper Escambray, maintains the highest rate of suspected cases. Data on dengue, the most dangerous of the arbovirosis circulating on the island this year, were very unspecific.
Sancti Spíritus, according to an article published this Wednesday in the newspaper Escambray, maintains the highest rate of suspected cases.
The authorities have been reluctant to give an absolute figure, but the data provided by PAHO show that a total of 9,602 people have already been infected, compared to 6,519 on October 23. This means that the incidence is 87.79 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, compared to 59.6 cases per 100,000 three weeks ago.
The numbers are from suspected and confirmed cases, in the 46th week of data, although they represent a small part of those actually on the island, since a large part of the population is reluctant to go to health centers despite the insistence of the authorities. Three weeks ago, when this newspaper reviewed the PAHO data on dengue, Cuba had reported 71 cases of severe dengue, but today it reports 115 cases, 62% more in just 21 days. Deaths are also reported: three in total, unchanged from mid-October.
Dr. Armas Fernández did give more precise figures for chikungunya, not for the first time. Last week, the national director of Epidemiology, Francisco Durán, placed the number at 20,062, while yesterday the cumulative figure had increased to 21,681, of which more than 20,000 had a clinical suspicion of the disease in 14 provinces, 93 municipalities and 151 health areas. Matanzas, Havana, Camagüey, Cienfuegos, Artemisa, and Villa Clara have almost all the cases, 98.5% of those diagnosed.
As for oropouche, experts stated that there has been no confirmed or suspected case since September 26.
“El objetivo fundamental de nuestro sistema es lograr el ingreso de todos los pacientes que tienen síndrome febril. Este ingreso puede ser en la vivienda o puede ser por los criterios que ya están aprobados”, afirmó Yagen Pomares Pérez, directora general de Atención Primaria y doctora en Ciencias.
“The fundamental objective of our system is to accomplish the admission of all patients with febrile syndrome. This can be home admission, according to criteria that are already approved,” said Dr. Yagen Pomares Pérez, the director general of primary care.
Pomares said that a new protocol has been approved for this situation based on the experiences of the Covid-19 pandemic, in which it is essential “to admit patients,” beginning with isolation at home, which, she admitted, is complicated.
She also indicated that there is a need for the health teams to continue monitoring the patient. For this, and in the midst of a collapse of staff and human resources in the health sector, “fifth-year medical students who now have the sufficient competence” have been mobilized. The experience now has been tested, as this newspaper reported last month and now confirmed on Tuesday by the official in Matanzas, the first province to suffer the serious epidemic.
The experts reported that there are demographic groups that must be hospitalized in all cases, such as children under two years of age, pregnant women and older adults
The experts reported that there are demographic groups that must be hospitalized in all cases, such as children under two years of age, pregnant women and older adults. They should be joined by people suffering from any disease that can be aggravated with a virus, from the hypertensive to the diabetic and any other condition that produces comorbidities. But the authorities are faced with the great challenge of citizens’ mistrust, who fear finding themselves in an institution where there are shortcomings of all kinds, including sanitation and being surrounded by others affected.
“We all know that the main concern of our population today is pesticide treatment, fumigation,” added Madelaine Rivera Sánchez, national director of Surveillance and Vector Control. She claimed yesterday that “it has not been possible to reach everywhere, as we have been accustomed to during the years of epidemic outbreaks.” However, it is not the first year that problems of fuel, supplies and personnel have complicated the task or made it impossible.
Although Rivera promised to try to reach urban areas or others where an intervention is called for, “there are some provinces in which it has not gone well because the teams have remained on the ground.” This disease, she said, “has had a very fast transmission rate due to the presence of the mosquito, and we must continue to carry out the main actions against the vector in order to be able, in the shortest possible time, to solve this problem that is affecting the entire population.”
Translated by Regina Anavy
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