Cuban Information Flows in the Time of COVID-19
Help us keep OnCuba alive The first half of an unforgettable year is past us. We have experienced simultaneously, in almost every country of the world, the fear of imminent death and physical pain. We were forced to halt to our daily lives, confine ourselves way from the streets, while the global economy induced itself into a coma, posing serious consequences for less developed countries such as Cuba. Many, when thinking about the presence of the virus in Cuba, foresaw a major disaster. Our precarious material conditions and inability to store products to resist long-term confinement, sizable high-risk groups—people over 60, who represent 20% of the population—and the low availability of ventilators at the ICUs were three of the principal causes for concern. The shortage of financial resources needed to import products during the pandemic, and the limitations to the Cuban economic and commercial activities caused by the blockade/embargo imposed by the United States, completed our Dantean outlook. Nonetheless, Cuba has achieved—in medical and epidemiological terms—praise-worthy results in the struggle against the pandemic. On June 23rd, there were 2,319 confirmed cases and 85 deaths in total. In less than three months—from March 11th, when the first cases were confirmed—Cuba managed to control the spreading...