Narcomar. Chapter 52. The Extraordinary Cuban Doctors

The government brought Cuban doctors who first came to help the then vice president of Ecuador, to search and rescue people with disabilities, of any origin, whether due to genetic or acquired causes, and even old age.

These doctors, together with health personnel from the Ministry, the Rural Health Network, and the armed forces, did an extraordinary job, reaching all corners of the country.

They helped disabled people with wheelchairs, anti-bedsores, prostheses, surgeries, etc., but also with a pension to their family members who cared for them, the disabled themselves, and with the obligation by law. to hire disabled people in public and private entities.

Later, many of those Cuban doctors went to work in hospitals, where specialists were lacking. or in the countryside, where Ecuadorean doctors did not want to go.

Five came to the Rural Health Network, a doctor and 4 doctors, who ended up in the most remote populations and close to the conflictive border with Colombia, where Ecuadorian doctors were afraid to remain because they were even kidnapped by the guerrillas, or the so-called irregular armed groups, who came to Ecuador to settle scores and kill people.

 A doctor worked in El Banano, a surgeon in Santa Rosa.

Those doctors were people with a mystique and a preparation that surpassed that of Ecuadorian doctors, especially those trained by the State University of Guayaquil.

The State University of Guayaquil produced the largest number of doctors, dentists, and nurses in the country

But it was a very conflictive university, controlled by the Marxist, Leninist, Stalinist Maoist Party, highly politicized, which even threw an economist into the auditorium of the medical school, as a candidate for the presidency of the republic. that one day he was an ally of the current president.

At the meeting in which the director of the La Esperanza Peasant Network asked whether doctors and dentists agreed with the hiring of Cuban doctors, only Máxima gave her vote in favor, but that did not prevent Cubans from being hired.

In El Banano, a Cuban doctor named Beatriz, worked in the sub-center, both of them agreed with Máxima to carry out vaccination and disease prevention campaigns.

- They say that the Cuban government exploits the doctors who work in Ecuador? - was Máxima's direct question to Beatriz.

-Well, now Cuban doctors are an export product from my country. We give you as much income as tourism. We are working in Africa, Latin America, especially where there are so-called progressive governments, such as Lula in Brazil, Chávez in Nicaragua, Evo Morales in Bolivia, and here in Ecuador.

-But you haven't answered me if they explode them or not? Maxima insisted.

- Well, what happens is that the government of Ecuador pays the government of Cuba, what a doctor earns here, but in Cuba that is a lot of money. The Cuban government gives us part of our salary to live well in the country, but the rest stays with them.

- How much do you earn?

- The government of Cuba charges the government of Ecuador 1600 dollars, more or less for each one of us, which I suppose is what you earn that as a doctor here, it leaves us half.

 Do you feel exploited? - Máxima asked him as they climbed the slope of the main street of Las Gaviotas.

Sometimes yes and sometimes no. What happens is that the doctors who work in the Rural Health Network are paid directly by Social Security. They earn twice as much as we do, they can also have an Ecuadorian residence after 5 years, we don't, but thanks to the government of my country I have been able to travel through Africa, Latin America, and many countries.

Often when she traveled to Quito every weekend, she met Laura, another Cuban doctor who worked in the Peasant Health Network, with her, but who already felt more Ecuadorian than Cuban, as she earned all her salary for herself.

-How are you? She -she asked Laura while they traveled to Quito on the bus.

"I don't know if they are going to renew our contract," she replied.

-  What's going on?

 The government of Ecuador has problems due to the fall in the prices of raw materials. Many of the doctors who worked for the Ministry of Health have no longer had their contracts renewed.

Do you think you will have to go back to Cuba?

God willing not. Things are not very good. I think a difficult period is coming for progressive governments.

Ecuador is doing very well with the government, but in Argentina and Basil things are not going well.

Brazil cannot do better. He has even organized the Olympics and now the World Cup-argued Máxima.

Brazil has gone crazy, and is wasting money on those events.

By the time she got to the dispensary, the boys she was doing theater therapy with had gathered in front of the dispensary television. It was the Brazil Germany match in Brazil.