A second Cuban health team made up of 21 Cuban doctors and 16 nurses and a logistics coordinator arrived in Italy this Monday to help combat the coronavirus pandemic and will be assigned to a new hospital installed in the city of Turin.
The 38 health professionals from the Henry Reeve brigade that the Cuban Ministry of Public Health sent to Piedmont arrived at the Turin Caselle airport after the region’s president, Alberto Cirio, asked for help through the Cuban embassy in Italy.
Sentida acogida en #Turín al 2do. grupo de la brigada médica #HenryReeve de #Cuba q llega a #Italia para ayudar en contención #COVID19. Asistimos junto al Pdte. Región de #Piemonte @Alberto_Cirio, Alcaldesa @c_appendino y otras autoridades. #13abril #2020 #OrgullosoDeSerCubano pic.twitter.com/Ns8bnrwiNE
— JoseCarlosRguez (@JoseCarlosRguez) April 13, 2020
The Cubans will be assigned to an old industrial building that has been converted into a hospital for COVID-19 patients who need to be hospitalized for semi-intensive care.
The brigade is made up of epidemiologists, anesthesiologists, resuscitators, general practitioners, and nurses specializing in intensive care.
Their arrival in Italy was made possible by a flight contracted by La Stampa newspaper’s foundation for solidarity works “Specchio dei tempi” and the Lavazza coffee company, at the request of the region.
Since last March 24, another Cuban health team made up of 37 doctors and 15 nurses has been working in the field hospital in the town of Crema, in the province of Cremona, in the region of Lombardy.
“Even facing the very challenge of containing #COVID19 in national territory, Cuba considers it essential to contribute to the necessary increase in solidarity, international collaboration and joint efforts at the global level to solve as soon as possible the enormous challenge imposed by this pandemic. Solidarity saves lives,” explained the Cuban ambassador to Italy, José Carlos Rodríguez Ruiz.
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And he added: “With modesty, Cuba offers the merit, the altruistic value and the proven capacities of its health professionals. We provide what we can and have, not what we have left over. That is the essence of international solidarity.”
Italy has received medical personnel from Russia, Albania, China and Ukraine to help hospitals in the face of a pandemic that has cost the lives of more than 20,000 people and exceeded the 159,000 infected in that nation.
Cuba, for its part, has already sent 20 medical brigades to combat COVID-19, in countries in Africa, Europe and the Caribbean.
