Doctors Urge U.S. To Accept Cuba's Offer Of 1586 Disaster-Trained Doctors

Doctors Urge U.S. to Accept Cuba's Offer of 1586 Disaster-Trained Doctors to Stop Katrina Epidemics

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ATLANTA, Sept. 7 /PRNewswire/ -- A prominent U.S. medical group voiced "deep concern" over delays in health care and epidemic prevention reaching Katrina victims, and urged U.S. authorities to accept Cuba's offer of 1586 disaster-trained physicians to prevent a "second wave of sickness and death."

Latest reports indicate the U.S. State Department is backing away from the offer, implying they are not needed.

"Up to this point, there been a clear need for more medical help for Katrina victims," said Peter Bourne, MD, Chairman of MEDICC and former special adviser on health in the Carter White House and former Assistant Secretary General at the United Nations. "The Cuban physicians are accustomed to working in difficult third-world conditions without the resources and supplies most of us are accustomed to. Since they are just an hour away, it is a shame that they have not been allowed to join our committed medical corps already."

He is joined by other physicians, medical educators, international health experts and a former U.S. surgeon general associated with MEDICC, Medical Education Cooperation with Cuba. From 1998 through 2004, MEDICC has provided medical electives in Cuba for nearly 1000 students and faculty from 118 U.S. medical, public health and nursing schools.

"Cuba has been recognized by the UN, Oxfam and other international organizations as a leader in disaster response, expertise that could be saving lives now," said Doctor William Keck, former long-time director of the Akron, Ohio Department of Public Health.

A 2004 Oxfam Report, Weathering the Storm: Lessons in Risk Reduction from Cuba, states that there are real lessons to be learned from Cuba on how to safeguard lives during extreme natural disasters, including getting medical attention to vulnerable populations. The report can be found at http://www.oxfamamerica.org/cuba.

On Tuesday, August 30, Cuba first offered U.S. authorities hurricane relief in the form of 1100 disaster-trained bilingual physicians, each equipped with 52-pound pound backpacks of medical supplies, including rehydration therapy, insulin, anti-hypertensives, and medications for systemic and topical infections.

On Saturday, September 3, Cuba increased the offer to 1586 doctors, ready for immediate deployment and prepared to stay as long as necessary to help wherever needed. A Cuban spokesperson said that as of today there has been no official response from the U.S. government.

Cuban disaster relief experience spans 45 years, mainly in hurricanes faced by the Caribbean island and in coping with disasters confronted by other developing countries. Another nearly 25,000 Cuban health professionals provide longer-term health care services in 68 countries, under government-to-government agreements.

Cuba trains 10,500 medical students from 27 countries at its Latin American Medical School -- 65 of them from poor and minority communities in the USA. (See The New England Journal of Medicine, 2004; 351:2680-82.)

"What an irony that the first U.S. MD to graduate from the school this August is a young African American from New Orleans," said Diane Appelbaum, RN, NP, MS. "He just passed the U.S. medical boards and is eager to fulfill the commitment he made in exchange for his free education from Cuba to serve the very poverty-stricken areas now devastated."

For additional first-hand reports and interviews from Cuba, please see MEDICC's on-line journal, MEDICC Review at http://www.medicc.org , Archives, Vol VI, No. 3, 2004 Disaster Management in Cuba: Reducing the Risk.

MEDICC (Medical Education Cooperation with Cuba) is a non-profit organization based in Atlanta. MEDICC is committed to maintaining institutional and educational links between the U.S. and Cuban medical communities. MEDICC publishes the English-language journal MEDICC Review, reporting on Cuba's medical and public health programs, available at http://www.medicc.org.

CONTACT:
Diane Appelbaum, RN, NP, MS
US Director, MEDICC
(678) 904-8090 http://www.medicc.org

White House swipes at Castro after Katrina aid offer

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WASHINGTON, 7 (AFP) - The White House answered Havana's offer of aid to help victims of Hurricane Katrina by saying it hoped Cuban President Fidel Castro would "offer freedom to his people."

Castro, who often deploys Cuban doctors abroad, has offered to send 1,586 doctors and 34 tonnes of medicine to the United States to help in the aftermath of Katrina, one of the worst natural disasters to strike the United States.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the US State Department was handling overseas assistance offers but added: "In terms of Cuba, we would certainly hope that Castro would offer freedom to his people."

The comments, which were not a rejection of Havana's offer, came after US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack did not rule out accepting the assistance, saying it would depend on the needs in the region.

"In terms of Cuba, I understand that there has been an offer of medical personnel. I think it is an offer, along with some other offers of medical personnel, that we will continue to take a look at," McCormack said Tuesday.

Speaking in Havana later Wednesday, the president of Cuba's parliament, Ricardo Alarcon, said Cuba was still waiting for a response to its offer of medical assistance for the US disaster zones.

"We are waiting for a response. I imagine it would not be easy to figure out a position, the reasons they will give, but it's urgent because there are people who need medical assistance," Alarcon said.

McClellan said 94 countries and international organizations had offered help to the United States, but he declined to say whether any of those assets were deployed along the storm-ravaged US Gulf Coast.

Cuba, under a strict US embargo for more than 40 years, has rejected past US aid offers to help the island recover from hurricanes.