Neither the Ministry of Health nor the IMSS-Bienestar provide data on how many specialists are in hard-to-reach areas.
14ymedio Mexico City, 8 August 2025 — Mexican health agencies do not know how many doctors were sent to marginalized areas, the primary objective for which 3,101 specialists from Cuba were hired. According to documents obtained via a request to government transparency agencies by the newspaper El Universal, there is a “lack of mechanisms” to evaluate the performance of the doctors for whom 92,525,569 euros (107,905,224 dollars) were paid between July 2022 and May 2025
The Transparency Unit of the Mexican Social Security Institute stated that the first collaboration agreement between the two countries establishes that the “results evaluation” would be handled by the General Directorate of Health Quality and Education, under the Ministry of Health, but that it does not have data on the participation of doctors from the island
The government agency argued that “the assignment of Cuban doctors was carried out in Medical Units of the Health Services of the Mexican Social Security Institute for Welfare–the free healthcare agency created in 2022 by the government of the self-proclaimed Fourth Transformation, headed by then-President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, replacing Seguro Popular–and in accordance with the coverage needs determined by the institution.
For its part, the Ministry of Health declared itself “incompetent” regarding the island’s specialists hired by Mexico. The agency delegated this responsibility to IMSS-Bienestar, stating that it “administers and operates the Cuban Medical Specialists plan.”
However, IMSS-Bienestar responded to the request for information with a document in which it stated that “assuming without conceding that such documentary information exists (…) it is outside the scope of jurisdiction.”
Last April, a source from the Health Department told 14ymedio that everything related to doctors is coordinated through the Cuban Medical Brigade, headed by Cuban Alfredo González Lorenzo , who reports to Neuronic Mexicana, which in turn reports to Neuronic SA Cuba. Since 2018, this company, whose president is the Cuban Tania Guerra, has represented the products and services of the island’s biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries.
The initial contract with Mexico was through Comercializadora de Servicios Médicos Cubanos SA de CV, a Cuban company accused internationally of human trafficking.
The presence of Cuban specialists has also been questioned due to the preferential conditions they receive. Between July 1 and the future, under the “logistical and operational support” scheme, Cuban doctors were given a diet that included “whole-grain bread and cereals, as well as low-fat dairy products and fruits, as well as vegetables, proteins, healthy fats, plants, and carbohydrates.” The food was supposed to be “satiating, yet easy to digest.”
Bribes to Cubans have been reported in 16 of Mexico’s 32 states. In Tabasco, 13,662,169 pesos (about $680,000) were allocated through Comercializadora de la Península del Mayab SA de CV. In Veracruz, 13,002,685 pesos were paid to Diego Valay Bernal for contracted services. In Sonora, the State of Mexico, Zacatecas, San Luis Potosí, and Morelos, 74,572,438 pesos were disbursed to Distribuidora Potosina Biofar. In a second installment, in Zacatecas, 9,784,097 pesos were paid to another supplier named Eduardo Escamilla Jaime, who in 2000 was awarded several bids by the municipal government of Fresnillo
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