The brigade made up of some 200 Cuban health workers will arrive in Argentina in the coming days, as confirmed Monday night by Ginés González García, the South American country’s minister of health. The news was ratified in an interview granted by the official to Channel A24.
Ginés García specified that the doctors will not have frontline positions, but “will come to alleviate the work of the Argentine specialists.”
The rumor about the arrival of a Cuban medical brigade had sparked a controversy weeks ago, when it was not denied by the national government and was advanced by the governor of the province of Buenos Aires, Axel Kicillof.
“It is not so that they take care of the sick on the front line, but so that they occupy some place in the system to replace the most experienced doctors,” González García confirmed.
To speed up the process, Cuban specialists will not carry out the 14-day quarantine, according to some local media.
Médicos cubanos despiertan confrontación política en Argentina
Since late last week reports started coming out that the Foreign Ministry had granted the brigade permission to land in Ezeiza. Cubans will arrive in a Cubana de Aviación plane in a matter of days.
At the close of this information, the Cuban Foreign Ministry had not yet referred to the matter.
Between 650,000 and 670,000 health workers in Argentina are fighting today the COVID-19, a disease that has infected 2,930 people here and caused the death of 134 others.