By Cheryl LaBash
Health ministers from throughout the Americas gathered in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 30, for a week of meetings to set regional health goals and priorities at the 57th Directing Council of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO).
The meeting opened, however, without Cuba’s Minister of Public Health Dr. José Ángel Portal Miranda. According to Reuters, the United States denied his visa, intentionally preventing a leading public health official from participating in an international meeting.
The U.S. slander campaign against Cuba’s renowned medical internationalism and well organized public health system cannot erase the experiences of human beings in underserved rural and urban areas around the globe who received culturally competent medical care from Cuban doctors when no one else would help them.














