Live
Audio Only
The Cuban doctors attended almost 3,000 patients over three months in the Piedmont area.
Thirty-eight members of Cuba's Henry Reeves Medical Brigade Monday arrived in Havana, after fighting COVID-19 in Turin (Italy) over the last three months.
RELATED:
Through a video, President Miguel Diaz-Canel welcomed the 20 doctors and 18 nurses who attended patients in an adapted hospital for almost 100 days.
Besides thanking them for their support in the fight against COVID-19 in the Piedmont region, he updated the group as to the economic and sanitary situation in Cuba.
Over the last three months, the Cuban health workers attended 2,918 patients in the Piedmont region, 177 of them in Turin’s red zone.
Cuba has sent thousands of doctors to 27 countries to fight COVID. It's the only medical contingent providing a global response to the pandemic. In a world that made sense, these selfless heroes would be granted the Nobel Peace Prize. @CubaNobel https://t.co/2SPJEcdJrG
— Abby Martin (@AbbyMartin) July 16, 2020
"From a humanistic point of view, the fact that we saved more than 170 lives and kept a low death rate meant a lot to us,” the Brigade leader in Italy Julio Guerra Izquierdo said.
By the time Cuban doctors arrived in Turin, the Piedmont region was the third most affected in the country, and shortly after that it became the second one.
“It was a bleak picture. We could feel people's fear, but from the moment we arrived we were applauded in the streets, and that represented a very big commitment,” Guerra recalled.
Piedmont’s Regional Council President Stefano Allasi granted the Henry Reeves Brigade with the Order of Civil Merit.
This is the first time the Order is awarded to recognize all the health personnel who fought COVID-19 in the region.
Newsletter
