If we were to choose an idea that summarizes what 2020 has meant for the public health sector in Cuba, we could say that It was the year in which the island’s health system survived a lethal pandemic without stopping any of its essential services.
Every day in these ten long months children were born, people with various pathologies were able to access millions of medical consultations, patients with cancer and other diseases were operated on, many saw in a transplant the miracle of the two chances … I don’t know interrupted the child’s immunization, rehabilitation, assisted reproduction, blood donations, dialysis program, specialized medical care for vulnerable groups …
More than 9,870 people, 85.1% of all cases diagnosed with COVID-19, recovered from the disease caused by the new SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. But thousands more lives were saved. Those who escape the pandemic and are also part of the victory these months.
Comprehensive healthcare in Cuba, life beyond the pandemic (+ Infographic and video)
In the midst of a complex global epidemiological scenario that still refuses to remit with the pain of the more than 140 people who died in Cuba
for that disease, the Cuban health system has proven its worth, both from the point of view of its structure, focused on the primary care of health, as well as the quality of its human resources.
The government’s will to put human life at the center of action
established that, before the first cases were detected on 11 March,
devised a plan of confrontation that had, among other strengths,
interdisciplinarity and integration with science.
The result is a favorable management of the epidemic, without regretting the death of any child, mother or health personnel among those who provide services in the country. Intensive care units have not collapsed either, but rather an adequate expansion of health facilities for patient care, contacts and suspects has been designed.
The country has managed to increase its diagnostic capacity in record time and today it has succeeded 18 molecular biology laboratories with coverage for 15 thousand PCR per day. From March to date, 61 suspected care centers have been organized and put into operation, as well as 286 for contact monitoring and another 73 for passenger isolation.
Only 3.6% of the total number of people confirmed since the beginning of the epidemic were treated in our Intensive Care Units and only 1.5% of all patients reached criticality.
More than 870 investigations were generated at this stage, many of them
born in hospitals, based on the experience and knowledge of professionals in the sector. Almost 200 are national in nature.
This practice has contributed to the improvement of human care protocols
sick and convalescent, which is already in six versions and is supported by many innovative Cuban products from the national biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, as well as research in other fields of knowledge, such as demography and genetics.
Today, 25 clinical trials are underway: 17 in progress and two completed. 10 authorizations were granted by the National Regulatory Agency, five of them for emergency use and six registrations of new medicines and biotechnological products for use in COVID-19.
Four candidates for the vaccine were born from this joint effort, which is in different phases of clinical trials, with encouraging results., which places Cuba in the first Latin American country to achieve such a result, as well as in the select group of 47 countries working so far to obtain an effective preventive vaccine against the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Sovereign vaccines are advancing significantly
Cuba has shared these teachings in international forums and virtual workshops and
It has also responded to several governments’ requests the deployment of 55 medical brigades from the Henry Reeve contingent, which fought against COVID-19 in 40 countries and territories, with more than 4,700 Cuban health professionals.
They have joined professionals who already serve in 59 nations
before the health emergency, which joined local efforts
against the new coronavirus.
VALIENTE: Lombardy and Havana, connected in the red zone (+ Photos and video)
The delivery of Cuban doctors, who went to places where the pandemic hit hard, such as the Italian regions of Lombardy and Piedmont, deserved international recognition, demonstrated by the support of many personalities and organizations for the nomination for the Award. The Nobel Peace Prize and the delivery of other prizes from the countries where they have offered their cooperation.
All this was done against the background of the increase in the campaign to discredit these collaboration programs and the intensification of the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the United States on the largest in the Antilles for almost 60 years.
Only between April 2019 and March 2020, the US siege caused losses of $ 160 million to $ 260,880 in the health sector, not including damage caused during the confrontation with COVID-19; stage in which Washington’s policy had an impact on the purchase of medicines, consumables, necessary equipment, such as lung ventilators and even prevented the arrival of aid from other countries.
The two pandemics in Cuba: the coronavirus and the US blockade
Despite this, Cuba has not stopped any of its core health programs. Permanent development of human capital, incorporation of new technologies, results of science applied to major health problems; as well as intersectoral actions, have contributed to to maintain favorable indicators of the health of the Cuban population, many of them in developed countries.
Preliminary data from the Ministry of Public Health show that:
- The mortality rate due to birth defects has been reduced from 0.8 to 0.7, the lowest in history.
- The mortality rate from 1 to 4 years decreased from 3.6 to 2.8 deaths per 10,000 inhabitants (which is 40 deaths less in children of this age).
- The mortality rate from 5 to 14 years decreased from 1.9 to 1.6 deaths per 10,000 inhabitants (with 36 fewer deaths), and the mortality rate for children under 5 years decreased from 6.6 to 6, 3 deaths per 1000 live births (67 deaths less than the previous year).
- Medical consultations in primary care increased from 84 million 316 442 in 2019 to 84 million 691 977 in 2020 (+375 thousand 535).
Despite the existing financial constraints, exacerbated by the economic crisis generated by COVID-19, the investment and maintenance program in the sector also remained active, favoring the revitalization of a large number of institutions.
In this regard, 1,863 doctor’s offices and family nurse and 280 polyclinics were constructively intervened.
The functioning of regionalized cancer care has remained stable in 45 sections of medical oncology, 25 of nuclear medicine, nine of radiotherapy and nine of oncopediatrics.
Regarding rehabilitation services, 494,153 people were hospitalized and 412,470 were rehabilitated, for 83.5% of the rehabilitated patients.
Investments in medical devices and equipment were also a priority at this stage. 200 new high-performance lung fans have been delivered to ICUs throughout the country, which means that, as a country, we reach an indicator of one fan per 10,000 inhabitants.
During these ten months of pandemic, the teaching activity, although readjusted to the conditions imposed by COVID-19, did not cease. Taking into account the fact that human capital is one of the most precious riches in the health sector, out of a total of 11,848 Cuban professionals graduating from various university careers, 8,950 correspond to Medicine, 1,510 to Dentistry, 578 to licenses. in Nursing and 810 in health technology.
More than 50,000 students participated in active research in different communities ala COVID-19 and 19,482 in voluntary surveys. Hundreds of them went to work in isolation centers.
Many other indicators in the system reflect the impact of systematic work in the sector. E.g:
- It is estimated that the mortality rate per 100,000 populations will decrease for influenza and pneumoniaand chronic diseases of the lower respiratory tract.
- The rate of premature mortality from 30 to 69 years has decreased from 4.4 to 4.3 per 1,000 populations.
- Health care for respiratory infections decreased from 82,308 in 2019 to 45,679 in 2020 (-36,629)
- Our country remains free of Zika, Chikungunya and yellow fever. Dengue cases are reduced by 72.3% compared to 2019 and the outbreaks of the Aedes aegypti mosquito by 6.2%.
- The rate of new HIV infections decreased by 19.4% compared to 2019. Mortality due to AIDS also decreased by 39%.
- Indicators are maintained to eliminate maternal transmission of HIV and congenital syphilis to children. In 2020, no children with HIV or cases of congenital syphilis were reported.
The undeniable quality of the universal and free health system and
prestige achieved over the years and ratified in the midst of the crisis,
they deserved it the country was elected a member of the board of directors of
Pan American Health Organization, overcoming the negative campaign of
The United States and the pressure on other states.
In recent days, the Minister of Public Health, Dr. José Angel Portal Miranda, at the ceremony held in Minsap by 62nd Anniversary of the Triumph of the Revolution declared:
“There are rights that often go unnoticed because they are everyday, but once conquered, they save us in times like the ones we live in today.”
“Cuba has spent six decades building, perfecting, defending the right to health, which is the right to life, six decades proving that a small and underdeveloped country can do science and can do it of the highest quality.”
Without these premises, the minister reflected how Cuba could have faced the social and health challenge posed by the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, the confrontation of which required an extraordinary effort on the part of the health sector. ?
“Then we can remember 2020, the year in which Cuba reaffirmed the importance of placing, since the triumph of January 1959, all its political will in the formation of scientific men and women, focused first on the well-being of the people. ; in training doctors, technicians and dentists to bring medicines to every corner of the country and the peoples of the world who have needed and need it; by designing and consolidating a unique, free, universal health system, able to manage its own human resources needs “, said Portal Miranda.
Undisputed certainties of the year ending. Reasons and reasons for 2021 in which the right to health continues to be an essential premise of the social and human work that the Cuban people have built.