Cuba Hosts Course to Train Health Workers from 19 Countries to Fight Ebola
HAVANA TIMES (dpa) — Around a hundred experts from 19 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean participated Monday in the opening day in Cuba of a course to deal with Ebola, the local media reported.
The training takes place in Havana through Friday on the prevention and treatment of Ebola, recently called for during a regional conference to coordinate measures against the disease.
Cuba is one of the countries leading the global fight against the disease, which has left some 5,000 people dead in Africa.
At the conference, held in late October in Havana initiated by the leftist ALBA bloc and supported by the Panamaricana Health Organization (PAHO), the United States also participated, despite its long ideological rivalry with Cuba.
During this week’s course the participants will be trained to deal with Ebola and “other viral hemorrhagic fevers,” explained the Cuban news agency Prensa Latina.
The seminars are held at the Pedro Kouri Institute of Tropical Medicine in Havana, which prepares the Cuban collaborators who travel to Africa to fight Ebola.
The island, with a population of just over 11 million people, received praise in recent weeks for sending 256 doctors and health workers to Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, the three countries most affected by the worst outbreak of Ebola in history.
According to the latest figures from the World Health Organization (WHO), the number of cases of Ebola in West Africa increased to 13,268 and nearly 5,000 people died from the epidemic.
According to WHO, Liberia remains the country hardest hit by Ebola, with 6,619 infections and 2,766 deaths.
Of course it is. I would also bet the curriculum includes a few hours of socialist/pro-Cuba propaganda as well. But if at the end of the day, the Paraguayan Health Minister or the Caiman Islands Public Health Officer is able to go back to their respective countries wiser with regards to the prevention and, if necessary, care of Ebola patients, the payment that MINSAP will receive from PAHO will be well worth it.
Then I will be the cynic and offer the speculation that the participants will be paying Cuba for the training. Like the rest of Cuba’s international medical program, this is a money making venture.
OK….wait for it……I think this is a great idea! So you see, I CAN say something good about the Castro regime after all.