Health workers complain of a lack of staff and medicines, too many patients to care for, and a terrible hygiene situation.
14ymedio, Ángel Salinas, Mexico City, 30 May 2025 — Going on a mission doesn’t always mean an improvement. The five Cuban doctors who arrived several weeks ago at the Los Mochis General Hospital in the Mexican state of Sinaloa know this well. The facility faces numerous criticisms for its poor conditions, similar to those of medical centers on the island: it lacks staff and medications, there are too many patients to care for, and the hygiene situation is appalling.
Hortensia, a relative of a patient at the center, confirmed to 14ymedio how depressing the situation is in Los Mochis, which is also located in one of the most tense and violent states due to drug trafficking. In this context, the Cubans—an anesthesiologist, an ophthalmologist, a nephrologist, a pathologist, and a cardiologist—have been, she admits, a “palliative” in the face of the lack of personnel.
However, the woman warns, despite the fact that “you hear in the hallways that there is a Cuban cardiologist,” her father—who suffers from ventricular arrhythmia—has never seen her and he has not “had the opportunity” to consult with the professional.
Their presence there has not represented a significant improvement in hospital care nor has it resolved their logistical problems.
In an interview with the local newspaper Debate, the hospital director, Luisa Reyna Armenta, acknowledged that there were Cubans working in Los Mochis and that thanks to Havana, “we have complete coverage” of the staff. She also said they were “quite hardworking.” The source interviewed by 14ymedio does not deny this, but emphasizes that their presence there has not represented a significant improvement in hospital care nor has it resolved the logistical problems, which are just as urgent as the staffing problems.
“What is still lacking here are pediatricians and neonatologists,” he explains. “A niece had to see a doctor at a private clinic because they don’t have these specialists here.”
Hortensia complains that there is also a shortage of medications in Los Mochis, a shortage Cubans are more than accustomed to. These aren’t basic drugs—like paracetamol, which is often available—but specialized treatments. “They never have amiodarone for arrhythmia or sacubitril to lower blood pressure. Without patented medications, you spend between 2,500 ($130) and almost 3,000 pesos ($150).”
The elderly relative’s pension “is not enough,” he summarizes, another situation with which it is not difficult to find a parallel between Mexico and Cuba.
Hortensia applauds the arrival of specialists, but states: “What are they going to do in a hospital where a few months ago, patients’ families had to bring their own fans because the air conditioning wasn’t working? It works now, but the cold season has arrived.”
The woman also reported a cockroach infestation. “The incident was a scandal. In a hospital that should have all the necessary hygiene protocols is unforgivable for this to happen,” she commented. The local press reported on the situation at the time. “A nurse went to apply medication and was surprised to see them on the bed, on the table where food is placed, and on top of my father,” a patient’s relative told a Sinaloa newspaper last April.
The hospital director acknowledges that “they still don’t have the necessary supplies,” but assures that patients are provided support in the blood bank, in the neonatal ward, in the intensive care unit, and in hemodialysis—”which is very expensive”—and that they treat between 18 and 20 chronically ill patients free of charge every day.
The hospital director acknowledges that “they still do not have the necessary supplies,” but assures that they treat between 18 and 20 chronic patients free of charge every day.
The Cuban doctors in Los Mochis are part of the more than 3,000 specialists Mexico has hired to care for the population of Guerrero Mountains, the area with the highest poverty rates and one of the most insecure, due to the presence of several criminal groups fighting over drug cultivation and trafficking.
An official from the 01 health jurisdiction, which is responsible for managing health resources, confirmed to 14ymedio that there are 82 Cuban doctors in Sinaloa. “In Baca, a community with 323 inhabitants, three were sent; in Choix, where fewer than 700 people live, there are another three; and in Chávez Talamantes, there are two general practitioners.”
At the end of September there were rising levels of violence in the state, where Los Chapitos—sons of drug trafficker Joaquín Guzmán Loera, sentenced to life in prison in the US—are fighting for control of the state with a faction of Ismael Zambada, known as El Mayo. The Cuban Embassy in Mexico recalled Cuban specialists who were in the Sinaloa town of Concordia, in the municipality of El Palmito. To date, they have not returned.
The Mexican government has been promoting the hiring of Cuban doctors for more than four years. The administration of Andrés Manuel López Obrador paid $5,188 per month to maintain each of the doctors on the island. This figure includes the salary—27,000 pesos ($1,351)—and the costs the government must cover for food, lodging, and transportation for approximately 966 healthcare workers. These travel expenses will also benefit the 2,135 specialists who arrived in the country this year, bringing the total number of doctors to 3,101.
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