US Orthopedic Docs Trip to Cuba Nixed

HAVANA TIMES, Sept. 6 – The U.S. government did not authorize a delegation of US orthopedists’ trip to Cuba to participate in the International Congress of Orthopedics and Traumatology, to be held September 21-26 in the eastern Cuban city of Bayamo, affirmed Rodrigo Alvarez Cambras, president of the Cuban Society of Orthopedics and Traumatology.

The US government routinely blocks scientific, educational and cultural exchange between Cuba and the United States.  While hopes still linger that President Obama will institute change in the hostile US-Cuba policy, most of the obstacles put in place by former administrations remain in tact.

The US has imposed a nearly half -century travel ban on its citizens from visiting Cuba without special permission from the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).