‘Educated under embargo’: How Cuban doctors vital to Latin America and the Caribbean became under threat by the US

The US is blocking the employment of Cuban doctors around the world – and the poorest will suffer the costs

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S pressure on Cuba is rising. A country that has already been under US-led and enforced embargos for almost 70 years, Cuba is now in the crosshairs of the Trump administration, with a new policy that is isolating it further and having a devastating effect on Latin America and the Caribbean. The US has blocked the employment of Cuban doctors, medical professionals who go where others fear to tread and who have propped up healthcare across the region for decades.

I spoke to the Guardian’s South America correspondent, Tiago Rogero, about the impact of Trump’s policy and what makes Cuban doctors special.

Thanks to sanctions, Cuba has two main sources of revenue, Tiago told me: “tourism and doctors”. Shortly after its 1959 revolution, Cuba established a programme to send its medical personnel overseas, with the first major mission deployed to assist Chile after its devastating 1960 earthquake. The scheme evolved from one of help during crisis into a structured series of agreements between Cuba and other countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, and around the world, to plug gaps in their healthcare systems.