Cuba–US relations: will public health lead the way?
2015; Elsevier BV; Volume: 385; Issue: 9962 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1016/s0140-6736(14)62476-4
ISSN1474-547X
Autores Tópico(s)Global Public Health Policies and Epidemiology
ResumoAt the recent American Public Health Association (APHA) Meeting (held in New Orleans, in November, 2014), leaders of the American and Cuban public health associations signed an agreement to collaborate. With encouragement from WHO, PAHO, and the World Federation of Public Health Associations, Georges Benjamin, Executive Director of APHA, and C Alcides A Ochoa Alonso, President of the Sociedad Cubana de Salud Pública affixed their signatures. Now that the USA plans to re-establish diplomatic relations with Cuba, will the handshake between public health associations help the two governments cooperate? The focus now moves to an April, 2015 meeting in Havana, where everyone—the US and Cuban public health associations and public health leaders from every country in the Americas will be invited to help build hemispheric cooperation in public health. Public health has overcome enmity in the past. Wars have been put on hold so that children could be immunised.1UNICEFImmunization in emergencies.http://www.unicef.org/immunization/23244_emergencies.htmlGoogle Scholar Can cooperation between their public health associations encourage the US and Cuban Governments to work together? I am Past President of the American Public Health Association, and Co-Editor of the Journal of Public Health Policy. I declare no conflicts of interest. Cuba: health lessons not under embargo2014 ended with a historic change in relations between Cuba and the USA. “After all, these 50 years have shown that isolation has not worked”, stated US President Barack Obama on Dec 17. Although issues around politics, freedom, and civil rights still stand and should not be overlooked, Obama pointed out, “Where we can advance shared interests, we will—on issues like health, migration, counterterrorism, drug trafficking and disaster response”. Obama cited health. With a life expectancy of 79 years, 67 doctors per 10 000 people (whereas the regional average is 21 per 10 000), and with hundreds of Cuban doctors now fighting Ebola in west Africa, health indeed does come to mind first when one thinks of Cuba. Full-Text PDF Health in Cuba: the other side of the storyIn the past years, The Lancet has published Editorials and Comments in support of the public health situation in Cuba, without taking into consideration the country's political situation. The Editors did this again in their recent Editorial (Jan 3, p 2),1 in which they support the re-establishment of diplomatic ties between Cuba and the USA on the matter of public health. However, Cubans live under a totalitarian regime that has silenced dissent, imprisoned, and killed opposition leaders.2 Persecution of dissidents continues today, as exemplified by the recent arrest of artist Tania Bruguera. Full-Text PDF Cuba–US collaboration and the role of bioethicsFor more than a half century, official relations between Cuba and the USA have been tense, fraught, and shaped by a mistrust which has not served the interests of ordinary Cubans or Americans. Despite official policies, some of those ordinary citizens—scholars, scientists, artists, and others—have forged ties based on mutual goals and objectives. Full-Text PDF
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