Cuban Ambassador Rebuffs Campaign against Salvadoran MDs Graduated in Cuba
Source: RealCuba.worpress.com, 09 January 2011.
Cuban Ambassador in El Salvador Pedro Pablo Prada rejected a campaign carried out by local rightwing political parties and press media to discriminate and slander Salvadoran students who graduated from the Latin American Medicine School (ELAM) in Havana.
Prada said in an interview with local radio station Radio Nacional on Friday that the ELAM School and Cuba itself had been rudely attacked, and he strongly rejected such attacks led by rightwing Republican Nationalist Alliance of El Salvador (ARENA).
The Cuban ambassador said that all the students who study medicine in Cuba –either Cuban nationals or foreigners- get a degree in Medicine; the syllabus is designed by the Public Health Ministry, and accredited by organizations such as the Pan American Health Organization and the World Health Organization.
He said that the medical study program is also accredited by many universities, including 10 of the most prestigious universities in the world. And he said that the slanders are taking a serious risk by attempting to talk on behalf of the Salvadoran medical community, which knows very well the Cuban public health system.
Prada recalled that even many Salvadoran doctors graduated in El Salvador have studied postgraduate courses in Havana. He refused the idea that the chance to study in Cuba for a foreign student becomes "a political scholarship" and demanded those who say so to bring solid evidence on the case.
He also gave information on the fact that many Salvadoran doctors who graduated in Cuba were prevented from being able to join the Salvadoran public health system, and others were victims of the so-called "Theft of Brains". The campaign was also rejected by officials of the Salvadoran and Cuban Public health Ministries, students, local political and social organizations and the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN).
