On Friday, President Joe Biden signed a law to support U.S. officials suffering from the so-called “Havana Syndrome,” which was allegedly provoked by "sonic attacks" perpetrated against the U.S. embassy in the Cuban capital from November 2016 to February 2017.
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The law authorizes the U.S. State Department and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to give more financial support to the victims of these "attacks," which have allegedly caused migraines, nausea, memory lapses, and hearing loss.
The U.S. State Department still cannot clarify the reasons for the Havana syndrome, which the international scientific community describes as unbelievable. Germany’s Dortmund University physicist Jurgen Altmann told The New York Times that he did not know of any acoustic effects that could cause concussion symptoms.
"There is no way that an acoustic device causes hearing damage using inaudible sounds. You can’t stimulate the inner ear in a way that could cause damage," Andrew Oxenham, psychologist of the Minnesota University Hearing Cognition and Perception Laboratory, also told to Buzz Feed News.
After the U.S. embassy reported the "attacks" in 2017, the Cuban government appointed a committee of police and scientific experts to investigate the case. It also authorized the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to conduct its investigation in Cuba with complete freedom. Both investigations concluded that there was no evidence to demonstrate any attack and that such symptoms could not be attributed to a common cause.
Despite this, U.S. President Donald Trump (2017-2021) accused the Cuban government of being responsible for the alleged attacks, which he used as a pretext to shut down consular services in Havana, reduce the presence of Cuban diplomats in Washington, and issue travel alerts to this Caribbean country.
During his electoral campaign, Biden promised to reestablish diplomatic relations with Cuba and remove many of the Trump's sanctions. Far from fulfilling his promise, he sanctioned Cuba’s National Revolutionary Police (PNR) and two of its leaders for containing the U.S.-backed destabilization attempts on July 11.