On 7 July Cuba dispatched 115 medics to Azerbaijan. These disease control and disaster response specialists form the latest of the Henry Reeve medical brigades which have been to 25 countries to combat Covid-19. The brigades’ work has inspired an international campaign calling for Cuba’s medical internationalism to be recognised with the Nobel Peace Prize.
In May, French solidarity organisation Cuba Linda was joined by Italian and Greek organisations in calling for the Henry Reeves Brigade to be nominated for the prize. The Mayor of Crema in virus-stricken Lombardy, Stefania Bonaldi, praised Cuban medics: ‘When you came here you said that your homeland is the world, so from now on you will always be our compatriots’.
By late July, a US-based petition calling for Cuba’s nomination (cubanobel.org) had gathered almost 30,000 signatures and is endorsed by many organisations including Pastors for Peace and Code Pink. An online Concert for Cuba dedicated to the brigades, on 18 and 19 July, featured Hollywood actors and musicians including soul singer Dionne Warwick and Rage Against The Machine guitarist Tom Morello.
This growing international campaign is pitted against the US administration’s aggressive efforts to end Cuba’s export of medical services, the island’s largest source of income. In 2018, ‘professional services’ exports (supplied at below world market prices, and subsidised for poorer countries) earned Cuba $6.4bn. A bill titled ‘Cut Profits to the Cuban Regime Act of 2020’, introduced on 17 June by Republican Senators Rick Scott, Marco Rubio, and Ted Cruz would require the US Department of State to assess countries that receive Cuban medical brigades in its annual Trafficking in Persons report rankings. The pretext for this is the claim that Cuban medics are ‘slaves’, a disgraceful attempt to portray Cuba as a pariah state (see FRFI 276). The ‘Tier 3’ countries on the Trafficking list receive restricted funding from the US and the US president can direct US-based development banks and the IMF to deny them loans.
The bill threatens to push several Caribbean Community (CARICOM) states onto ‘Tier 3’, resulting in sanctions. CARICOM countries drew on the assistance of the Henry Reeve Brigade, as they have done in past emergencies, as imperialist nations abandoned them in the pandemic.
Ramping up aggression against Cuba is a key plank of Donald Trump’s re-election strategy, by appealing to wealthy right-wing Cuban exile organisations in the swing state of Florida. Trump scorns what he calls the ‘Obama-Biden sell out to the Castro regime’. With rival Joe Biden currently nine points ahead in Florida, Trump’s strategy may backfire. Concerted international support for Cuba’s medical internationalism can only help isolate Trump and the reactionary exile lobby.
Will Harney
FIGHT RACISM! FIGHT IMPERIALISM! 277 August/September 2020
