There are many examples and the happiness of hundreds of Argentines who have been able to regain their vision through the Operation Miracle program in this southern nation.
And, above all, the pride of men and women who achieved their dreams of practicing medicine and put it into practice under these postulates acquired from the hand of their Cuban masters.
Paradigm in the world, the Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM), has spread its seeds in Argentina, where there are stories to tell, from many of these young parents were taken from their lives by the violent dictatorship military of 1976, until a doctor mapuche and another wichi.
| Hugo Saidon and Esteban Sotelo |
Today, from so many testimonies, in Haiti two young people save lives and offer their help to this battered country, again by an earthquake. There, Hugo Saidon and Esteban Sotelo were able to reunite with their Cuban brothers, who have been doing humanitarian work for the benefit of the Haitian people.
The pride of being part of the ELAM, Saidon and Sotelo -members of the Argentine mission of White Helmets- wear it tattooed in their souls and unconditionally claim from this country to Prensa Latina that they bring solidarity and internationalism that go learn in your adopted country. Homeland is humanity, they say.
From Tujuayliya Gea Zamora, 34, the first Wichi village woman to obtain the title of doctor, graduated in 2010 in Cuba and delivered to community health in the northern province of Salta, through the TATU proposal, made up of several graduates who have been providing health services in the most vulnerable areas of the province of Buenos Aires for more than a decade.
There are many stories about Cuban medicine in Argentina.
Only from the Ernesto Che Guevara Ophthalmological Center in the province of Córdoba, the figures speak for themselves: seven thousand 27 operated, of them four thousand 39 cataracts, 2000 443 Pterigium and 545 laser. Not counting the more than 34 thousand 456 pre and post operative consultations and 56 thousand 216 ophthalmology.
| Che Guevara Ophthalmological Center |
Precisely the Center is one of the most relevant of this medical cooperation in Argentina, which was born precisely with the Miracle Mission in the framework of the historic Summit of the Peoples in the Silver Sea, in 2005.
In that year the foundation A Better World is Possible (Unmep), after an idea of the historical leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, to arm a legal tool by which the programs of cooperation in Argentina could be put , Operation Miracle emerged and preceded by the literacy program Yo, sí puc.
Claudia Camba, the president of Unmep, keeps that image fresh in 2006 in Fidel’s Córdoba and the Venezuelan president, Hugo Chávez, full of ideas to carry out this project throughout South America.
It was a magical thing, Fidel and Chávez in a melancholy look, dreaming of this Latin America with this transformation in which nothing had a limit, in which everything was possible, explains Camba Latin Press, after adding that it was and is a revolutionary task that we have to keep doing.
The referent of the foundation relates that Cuba and the missions have left a great mark on him since he first met the island in 1996, in the so-called special period, and fell in love with its people and the clarity that they had where the real enemy was from, while in Argentina neoliberalism was booming.
It was at this time that he decided to dedicate his life to solidarity with Cuba and through the project he leads today to know the reality of excluded peoples, indigenous communities, farmers …
Since then, she has been clinging to the teaching that one of the best ways to show solidarity with the Revolution is to work to lay the foundations that one day this revolutionary change must have in Latin America, she pointed out.
After highlighting the great internationalist work of Cuban doctors in the time of Covid-19, Camba is no less surprising as an island in the Caribbean, besieged by a fierce blockade imposed by the United States for six decades, handing over his knowledge, but especially his love and solidarity.
In our case, he says, he has marked and continues to mark history, for example, in the north of the country. He explains that when they were in Bolivia, the merger that took place between Argentine and Cuban doctors was incredible, it was to sow the dawn from the villages.
The connection, the love, what has been achieved with the medical cooperation in Córdoba is so strong that a few weeks ago there was a march for the Day of the National Rebellion in Cuba, on July 26, as rarely. have been seen in this province.
In the opinion of the president of Unmep, what sows Cuba with medical solidarity are this new man and woman so that both Che and Fidel Castro fought.
A visual center in the village service (subtitle)
At the Ernesto Che Guevara Ophthalmology Center, the deep traces of Cuban medicine in Argentina can be seen today. There, in this small hospital, many villagers, completely free of charge, have regained their vision.
From operations and surgeries, to investigations in territories, articulating with sister organizations working in the humblest areas of the city. Today, Argentine doctors, many graduates on the island, continue to contribute their grain of sand.
As a way of responding to the deepest inequalities, the teams of the A Better World Foundation are possible, they also go further and take their work to the neighborhoods.
With dedication, the Center’s medical and non-medical teams, mostly volunteers, achieved another goal.
The implementation of the health program from a community vision from a space of training of Gender, Health in general and visual health to different people of a neighborhood near the Center, with the aim that those who are trained they can act as health promoters and at the same time detect problems in their community. The network continues to expand today.
A Mapuche saves lives in their community (subtitle)
Alejandra Ayllapan was 20 when she arrived in Cuba to fulfill a dream that seemed elusive to her. Of Mapuche origin, his mother had under his care four other brothers. Today, at the age of 42, she proudly practices medicine and her specialty as an ophthalmologist.
Account to Latin Press that in the year 2000 studied in the city of Buenos Aires of the Silver, but by economic questions it could not continue, until the scholarship of the ELAM arrived to him. For me Cuba was a great lesson, he asserts.
He joined the studies back in Havana and from the first moment was in contact with patients.
The learning was so special, especially with the teachers, whom I have always felt like my family, today at a distance I still maintain the relationship with them, he says.
Its history is very special. In 2000, Argentina voted against Cuba at the United Nations, and his mother sent a letter to then-President Fernando de la Rúa that went around the world.
Ayllapan recalls that just arrived in Havana, this Caribbean country was experiencing important moments such as the struggle for the return home of the infant Elián González, and the battle for the release of the five Cuban anti-terrorists imprisoned in the United States.
| Alejandra Aaypallan with Fidel |
In one of his experiences, he participated in the traditional Labor Day parade. This May 1 will never be forgotten. It was the first time he saw Fidel Castro face to face when he tried to break through a barrier to greet Claudia Camba, the president of Unmep.
We talked about me and he was very interested to know the situation of the original peoples, how is the education we get, I do not remember how long this conversation lasted, but I will never be erased from memory, he recalls after showing with proud of the photo that immortalized this moment.
I had to thank him for the opportunity he was giving us to thousands of Latin Americans who for various reasons could not realize our dream of studying in our country, he stresses.
For this Mapuche doctor working in her country through the Miracle Mission has been a great experience as well as the battle they lived to be able to validate their professional titles here.
He practiced in the most remote areas of the north of the country, where he corroborated that it is very different from the south. She knew the situation of other original peoples totally different from that of the southern Mapuches, this enriched her and led her to lean towards ophthalmology.
Today the fruits are palpable. From the Rogelio Cortizo Hospital, in the town of Enginyer Jacobacci, in the province of Rio Negro, where 13,000 people live, he began his struggle as a general practitioner and already has a project that allowed him to open a doctor’s office. ophthalmology in the locality.
In this time of pandemic he returned to general medicine and the anecdotes are many. From referring a critical patient with unconditional routes, to carrying an incubator on their legs with a premature baby, in the middle of snow or mud to connect it to the ambulance’s electricity.
Facing these situations has a lot to do with everything he learned in Cuba. Sometimes with what little you have you have to try to do the best you can. Cuba has taught us this, not to give up, he emphasizes after thanking his second homeland, for which he now demands in order to blockade wherever he goes.
And that’s not all (subtitle)
This gratitude is multiplied by each of the Argentine graduates on this Caribbean island and who today put their bodies every day in the fight against the pandemic in their country of birth.
Laura Failand, Head of the Medical Department of the Directorate of Unscheduled and Scheduled Medical Care in the Argentine capital, graduated in 2006 from the Faculty of Medical Sciences in the Cuban city of Cienfuegos and also has the postulates rooted in her life. acquired there.
To a question from the Latin Press about what it meant to study medicine in Cuba and how much it reported to him, he answers that it was a dream surpassed by reality and marked it in the struggle for quality health for all.
In this task he is carrying out today, he describes the commodification of health as an aberration. Unfortunately, we are far from having this human right as a goal in all countries, he said.
The experience of having lived in a model in which health is only public, made me understand that it is the best possible practice of medicine possible, as a collective good for the development and evolution of societies.
Today he takes the opportunity to send a greeting to Cuba and its doctors. I am eternally grateful to have been trained with the principles and fortitude of all the health personnel on the island, sentence.
History will be indebted to those with whom they selflessly engage in their activities in terms of health care, as well as in the training of new professionals and fundamentally in the dissemination that another model of health is viable, exists and can prosper, says Dr. Failand, after sending a message to her Cuban colleagues: “Until victory, always!”
* Chief Correspondent of Latin Press in Argentina
Rmh / May