Introduction: Cuba as a World Medical Power

Abstract

Clearly and certainly not surprisingly, the above quotations demonstrate that Che Guevara and Henry Kissinger had very different ideas about the nature of the Cuban Revolution’s potential role on the world stage. Guevara, who had been trained as a physician in Argentina before becoming radicalized and joining Fidel Castro’s guerrillas on an odyssey that would eventually lead him into the realm of legend, is thinking in terms of self-sacrifice and service in the pursuit of basic human needs (e.g., health care) that will earn the Revolution the gratitude and respect of not only the Cuban people but also those in other countries (i.e., “one’s neighbors”) who are fortunate enough to become the beneficiaries of Cuban aid initiatives. Kissinger, on the other hand, reacts with both incredulity and contempt to the notion that Cuba could or should be seen as a major player in international affairs. Admittedly, Kissinger’s outburst was not prompted by Cuba’s commitment to the kind of health care and related aid programs to which Guevara was referring, but instead it was in reaction to the Revolution’s extensive (and successful) military initiatives in Africa in the 1970s (e.g., in Ethiopia and especially Angola). In reality, however, the “global foreign policy” that was creating so much consternation on Kissinger’s part involved more than just the military activities that tended to attract the most attention, especially from Washington and the U.S. mass media. Indeed, there was another key element to these internationalist initiatives that, although more low-profile than Havana’s military campaigns, proved to be much more significant in the long run. This often overlooked dimension entailed Cuba’s extensive developmental aid efforts, at the center of which were its health care programs. Various sources indicate that the number of Cuban developmental aid personnel (mostly medical professionals) working overseas in the late 1970s totaled approximately 14,000 (mostly in sub-Saharan Africa), with the figures rising as high as 46,000 in the late 1980s.¹

The life of a single human being is worth a million times more than all the property of the richest man on earth …Far more important than a good remuneration is the pride of serving one’s neighbor. Much more definitive and much more lasting than all the gold that one can accumulate is the gratitude of a people.

Che Guevara, 1960, On Revolutionary Medicine

It is time to overcome the ridiculous myth of the invincible Cubans. Who ever heard of Cubans conducting a globalforeign policy?

Henry Kissinger, U.S. secretary of state, 1978