Unjust U.S. blockade hinders production of medicines

 

SANTIAGO DE CUBA, Cuba, Nov 1 (ACN) By forcing Cuba to purchase raw materials and consumables in distant and therefore more expensive markets, the unjust U.S. blockade tampers with this city’s efforts to produce and import medicines.

Lídice Céspedes, provincial director of the Division of Medicines and Medical Technology, remarked that the region’s list of basic medicines for 2023 includes 602 drugs, 220 of them imported, but purchasing them in third countries becomes harder and delays their delivery to the patients.

She pointed out that Cuba lacks 266 drugs and 109 raw materials and reagents for diagnosis in areas such as Clinical Laboratories, Microbiology, Pathological Anatomy, Medical Care and Hospital Disinfection, due to technological problems in the country’s industries, which have to import spare parts at a higher cost.

Medical specialists and officials referred to the intensification of the blockade, which also affects cancer patients, whose medicines are extremely expensive, as well as Cuba’s programs for transplant and cardiovascular surgery, assisted reproduction, and tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS treatment. No less serious is the damage caused to the regional production of chemical and natural medicines, they said, adding that specialties such as Pediatric Cardiology, Nephrology, Geriatrics and Dermatology suffer from the genocidal siege, intensified during the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the report Necessity of ending the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the United States of America against Cuba, submitted this year to the United Nations General Assembly, the Cuban pharmaceutical industry is facing unheard-of stress because of its inability to have relations with dozens of suppliers around the world, who have cancelled contracts, raised prices and refused our requests, all of which has caused losses to the Cuban health care system amounting to almost USD 4 billion since the blockade was put in place more than six decades ago.