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Cuba: When Death is Quicker than the Ambulance

HAVANA TIMES – Independent media sources recently reported another death of a Cuban while waiting for an ambulance: on May 10, Jose Luis died of a probable heart attack in Vedado, Havana. On April 6, the same fate befell Alexis Rosales in Santiago de Cuba; in January, Yordanis Beltrán died in the same city. The common factor in all three cases was the delay in the arrival of emergency medical services.

A few weeks ago, a colleague from another country, who lives in Havana, told me, with sadness, astonishment, and anger, how he saw a man die in El Curita park (Central Havana). The man had fallen on the pavement and stopped breathing right there. Groups of passersby surrounded the body and began filming it with their phones, adding an element of morbid curiosity to the misfortune.

Unfortunately, this type of tragic news isn’t new, or even very rare (a fact that is scandalous in itself). It doesn’t surprise me, since I myself have witnessed similar situations.

Obviously, the US embargo hinders the acquisition of ambulances, spare parts, fuel, etc. However, these problems precede Trump’s recent sanctions: the deficient quality of the emergency medical services has been an endemic problem in Cuba for decades.

The Unified Emergency Medical Service (SIUM) was created about a quarter of a century ago, and the official media frequently report on donations of ambulances from friendly countries and humanitarian agencies. But it is clear that the problem remains unresolved. This is an odd situation for a country famous worldwide for the much-touted quality of its healthcare system: in many nations that lack the sophistication of the best Cuban medicine, emergency care—including timely transport by........

© Havana Times