Field hospitals Are not Enough, America Needs Cuban Doctors
Right now what America needs is Cuban doctors. Not illegal aliens from the southern border who take American jobs.
The surgical hospital Hermanos Ameijeiras, Havana, Cuba.
As we speak, the United States is facing a severe health crisis.
Americans are dying, and the Angel of Death is not refraining from taking the life of a person whether he is white or black, Republican or Democrat, a white supremacist or a hardened communist.
Now hospitals are being overwhelmed, with not enough beds for everyone.
But, doctors and nurses are becoming more efficient in taking care of Covid patients. They have gained rich experience in a fairly short period of time.
A nurse who works at the University of Pennsylvania hospital told me how they tell Covid patients to lie on their stomachs so it will be easier for them to breath. They are getting better at treating patients, she said. Indeed, while Covid cases are high and growing, recovery rates are also high.
At the same time, hospitals are at their full capacity, or nearly there. That is not a huge issue, however. Field hospitals are being erected across the nation.
A far bigger issue is the lack of enough medical personnel.
In Europe they are considering hiring almost-fully qualified immigrant medical doctors, even if their degrees are not fully recognized. Indeed, in Germany, doctors from other countries whose degrees have not received full accreditation yet are already been at work in hospitals for months.
We need to find a practical solution to the shortage of doctors, but the solution, or part of it, may be easier than we think.
90 miles off our shore is a small island named Cuba. In this tiny island, the government sponsors and educates doctors for free, then sends these doctors abroad. The economy is harsh in Cuba but the doctors are well-educated.
Cuba has been sending doctors all over Latin America, but then thanks to pressure of the Trump administration and the election of President Bolsonaro in Brazil, these doctors have been expelled.
President-elect Joe Biden has a golden opportunity to do what’s best for the nation. This is the time to put pass grievances, moralism and political gains aside. Nothing is more precious than a human life regardless of political or sexual orientation.
The Biden government should ask for help from Cuba. It may be safe to say Cuba can send hundreds if not thousands of doctors within a very short period, if it agrees to do so. It should be reminded that Cuba has been under American sanctions since 1959 and until the present.
It should also be noted that in the US, an active Cuban lobby exists that strongly opposed the government of Cuba. A large contingency of Cuban-Americans in Florida voted for Donald Trump. It is understandable why they would oppose the Cuban government. Many of them had their homes and assets confiscated by the Cuban revolutionary regime of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. These Cuban-Americans see Biden as a socialist. They would not vote for him anyway.
A far more contradictory position is the one held by Cuban Democrats. They dislike the government of Cuba, they want the US government to spend more money in the United States on social spending, but it did not occur to them to ask Cuba to send doctors here. Indeed, it can be said that the thinking of some Cuban-American liberals is profoundly irrational. They want to have generous welfare in the US while they escaped Cuba, they want to open the doors to a whole wide array of Latino immigrants including those with questionable backgrounds, but it did not occur to them that Cuba could help right now but simply sending doctors. Bandits and illegal aliens are welcome, Cuban doctors are not, is their slogan.
Even if the Cuban doctors are not enough to meet America’s needs, at this stage they could make a difference.
The key to Americans’ recovery and lives may lie with having the common sense to ask Cuba for help. Cuba is our neighbor, we need what it has (doctors). Let’s get to work.
