Assata’s Daughters

PBS Doc – “Cuba’s Cancer Hope”

When the U.S. trade embargo left Cuba isolated from medical resources, Cuban scientists were forced to get creative. Now they’ve developed lung cancer vaccines that show so much promise, some Americans are defying the embargo and traveling to Cuba for treatment. In an unprecedented move, Cuban researchers are working with U.S. partners to make the medicines more widely available.

https://bit.ly/2VbIhbF

The amount of support and national solidarity displayed during these times has also been nothing short of amazing. The Ping An Finance Center – the fourth tallest building in the world – is lit up every night with encouraging messages to Chinese citizens to support each other and fight on. I strolled through downtown one night and found that all the skyscrapers had been proudly emblazoned with huge digital images of courageous doctors and nurses on the front-lines in Wuhan as if they were rock stars. This last week there was a national moment of commemoration. Loud sirens were blared throughout the city and every car on the street was blasting their horns as loud as they could go. The event was to mourn those who had lost their lives to COVID-19, but also to signify that China had won – they had beaten the virus.

Experiencing firsthand how the pandemic was handled here really makes me proud to live in a country that puts the needs of its people as its first priority. Life is truly returning to normal in China, but it’s only because socialism carved a path to victory and helped save humanity.

http://www.radiohc.cu/en/noticias/nacionales/218415-congressional-black-caucus-asked-to-promote-emergency-legislation-for-access-to-cuban-drug?fbclid=IwAR3cXpYQBrBslv-WjTmJnV14obfwF4l8Y4SALVNaUW_T7OwmdvpQLUDf9_4

Washington, April 1, 2020 (RHC)–The American people would benefit today from Cuba’s experience in the battle against COVID-19 if the blockade were lifted, say New York activists in a letter to the Congressional Black Caucus.

At a time when the numbers of infected and dead in the country -which has become a global epicenter of the pandemic- are soaring, Dr. Rosemari Mealy and lawyer Joan Gibbs are calling for the promotion of emergency legislation for access to proven Cuban medicines such as Recombinant Human Interferon Alpha 2B, used with good results in China.

Mealy and Gibbs, whose work focuses on developing legislative, local, and national strategies in mobilization efforts to end the US blockade against Cuba, urge the Caucus in their letter to take immediate action during this pandemic, Prensa Latina highlights.

It is ‘an appropriate moment to raise the issue of respect for Cuba’s sovereignty and to reverse the draconian anti-humanitarian policies of the Trump administration’, they suggest.

In their letter, the solidarity activists also recognize ‘Cuba’s biotechnology industry, especially in the area of research and production of pharmaceuticals’ and list successful ‘vaccines for eye infections, lung cancer and more’.

At the same time, they reiterate that the organizations IFCO-Pastors for Peace, Cuba Si -NY, the National Network on Cuba and many other groups in the United States ‘will continue to demand the repeal of the Helms-Burton Act, the lifting of the blockade and the end of the travel ban.’

They also regret that the advances of friendship and respect for mutual sovereignty that began under the Obama administration have been dealt a blow from the Trump administration, which has set the clock back decades.

They said it is “shameful” that the United States sells weapons of mass destruction to other nations while Cuba is criticized for sending its trained doctors all over the world to relieve the pain and suffering of people.

In their call to African-American legislators, Mealy and Gibbs recall that 175 American physicians trained at Cuba’s Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM) who are now part of the frontline army of health professionals contributing their services during the COVID-19 pandemic throughout the US.
Commenting about the situation in New York, ‘it’s terrible, and it will get worse because there is no leadership from this president and the Republicans’, Mealy told Prensa Latina.

More than 3,300 people have died so far in the United States,” she said, but “Trump’s only concern is the stock market and profits instead of people,” she lamented.

“The pandemic, for the people of this country, represents the latest disaster of capitalism,” she concluded.

Hello all!

In response to the coronavirus outbreak, the White House has made sweeping changes to the country’s immigration apparatus, altering daily operations and disrupting the lives of thousands, says CNN.

Since early March, there have been at least a dozen changes, ranging from postponing immigration hearings to pausing deportation flights to certain countries and suspending refugee admissions. The administration is also trying to push some of its most restrictive policies amidst this crisis that have struggled to be put into practice, including blocking entry to asylum seekers.

For more on how the coronavirus has impacted immigration, click here.