In The Medical Missions, More Hardship Than Money

In The Medical Missions, More Hardship Than Money / 14ymedio, Orlando Palma
Posted on September 14, 2015

14ymedio, Orlando Palma, 12 September 2015 — Tania (not her real name)
is one of the 3,525 workers of the Ministry of Public Health from
Camagüey who work in around 50 countries around the world. Her medical
mission abroad just ended and now she is trying to readapt to her own
country. However, two years away from her native province has changed
this therapy and rehabilitation specialist forever.

"Despite all the difficulties I had to face there, I now have the
impression that I have traveled back in time," she explains. Her stay in
Venezuela was not without setbacks. Living in a poor neighborhood in
Caracas, Tania had to deal with violence, food shortages and the
increasing animosity among many Venezuelans against Cubans who are on
official missions.

"It never crossed my mind to escape, because I have my two children here
and they would punish me so that I couldn't see them for years"

There are 2,063 aid workers in Venezuela from this Cuban province. Most
of them provide services in the so-called Barrio Adentro (Inside the
Neighborhood) and Operation Miracle missions. Several of Tania's
colleagues were distributed among the states of Apure, Aragua, Carabobo,
Guarico, Miranda and Zulia. She says she "was luckier" to stay in the
capital, "where there are more options."

Of the 323 health technicians from Camaguey that were recorded in the
middle of this year in the South American country, not everyone made it
to the end of the regulation time. "We had multiple desertions and one
way to prevent people from continuing to escape to Colombia or the
United States was to take away our passports," this woman explains. And
she adds, "It never crossed my mind to escape, because I have my two
children here and they would punish me so that I couldn't see them for
years."

Through the US program known as Cuban Medical Professional Parole
(CMPP), as of 2006 a provision was implemented that allows Cuban
physicians who participate in official medical missions to qualify for a
visa to enter the United States. More than 720 health professionals from
the island escaped from Venezuela between January and late August this year.

Tania had a fixed goal in mind, "to make money to enlarge my parents'
house and have a private place for my marriage and my children," she
says. However, the money accumulated in months of hardship in Caracas
was not enough to complete the long-awaited housing. "All construction
materials are very expensive and we could not finish the bathroom or the
kitchen." After two years of work she managed to save the equivalent of
five thousand dollars, which she brought home with her.

Tania had a fixed goal in mind, "to make money to enlarge my parents'
house and have a private place for my marriage and my children

"I had to sweat for this little piece of land," she says. "We were in a
shared house and drank instant soup almost every day," she says of her
life in Caracas. "All I bought was something to bring to my children, a
flat-screen television and a laptop for the older one." To achieve this
she had to "give up many necessities. We lived like dogs in a shelter,
on top of each other, without any privacy," she remembers.

On her return to Cuban, the young woman has taken up the business of
reselling food products and drinks, which she buys at a discount thanks
to a magnetic card she received for having been on a foreign mission.
"Here," she says, while showing the plastic rectangle, "I have
accumulated the Cuban salary paid to me every month that I couldn't
collect over there, as well as a bonus in convertible currency."

As a health professional who participated in Barrio Adentro, now she
gets a discount on products she buys in stores in convertible
currency. "It can reach 10 or 15 percent off, particularly for soft
drinks and beer." So the specialist in rehabilitation therapy and is now
dedicated to reselling drinks to families who are organizing wedding
parties or quinceañeras (girls' fifteenth birthday parties). Everyone wins.

"We lived like dogs in a shelter, on top of each other, without any privacy"

"With that I'll be able to get the dishes and the plumbing fixtures I
need to buy," she says. However, she believes that the remuneration that
she received for her work abroad was "not much for the effort." It was
not only the workload, she says. "I had a friend who had a nervous
breakdown because she was trapped in a riot in the street; she's still
under psychiatric treatment and, as she didn't finish out her contract,
she didn't get the salary bonus."

Despite the difficulties, Tania wants to return to a new mission. "I
already have contacts in South Africa for an individual contract," but
this time, she explains, "I will take my family… and if I ever saw you,
I don't remember."

Source: In The Medical Missions, More Hardship Than Money / 14ymedio,
Orlando Palma | Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/in-the-medical-missions-more-hardship-than-money-14ymedio-orlando-palma/