Fired Cuban docs return to Jamaica with private contracts, cutting Havana out of deals

Dozens of Cuban doctors, nurses and biomedical engineers have returned to Jamaica, this time to work with individual contracts rather than through arrangements made by the Cuban government, as was the case in the recent past, officials said this week. The new arrangements have everything to do with an unrelenting amount of pressure the Trump administration has been placing on the Caribbean government to cease paying the Cuban government for supplying medical brigades to the region as the government back home had only been offering them about 20% of their monthly salary packages. Secretary of State Marco Rubio had deemed the decades-old payment system as a form of human trafficking, suggesting that governments should abandon them and negotiate individual contracts with the workers like Jamaica and some of the regional member states have done. Rubio has also called for an end to the program altogether. Health Minister Chris Tufton told reporters that authorities have reengaged 157 medical personnel to work across the northern Caribbean island in addition to more than 40 who had opted to remain there when the old arrangements were terminated earlier this year. He said the Cubans will stabilize a system that needs their expertise. “So, we are close to where we were, and they have been appropriately deployed. The renegotiated agreement with our Cuban health care workers has resulted in, to date, an engagement of some 157 Cuban medical professionals, including doctors and nurses, who have returned to Jamaica to support health-care delivery across the island. I want to thank those who have chosen that option because the system needs them,” he said. The previous brigade had 278 members. He also stated that every single Cuban who had previously been in the health system had been offered individual contracts and had to indicate if they were interested in returning. Those who have not returned will be welcomed if they do. "We’d be willing to re-engage them based on their own interests, but on the basis of individual contracts," he said. "Some have expressed an interest in doing so, even though they have returned to Cuba. So, yes, there is an open invitation, which we have set for the record and we have received some information that some are interested in. If they come, then we would be prepared to engage them." The minister also announced that efforts to recruit medical personnel from Ghana and Nigeria will continue as part of a development improvement plan for the sector by 2030. He expects up to 400 Ghanian personnel could be on the island in the coming months, while Nigerians will also be recruited. "In the case of Nigeria, the new agreement builds on the health cooperation already underway," he stated. "Previously, we had welcomed four specialized nursing educators under the Nigerian technical aid corps program, who continue to contribute to specialized training and service delivery in the public health system." The Trump administration's policy and its campaign to change the payment system have resulted in major changes to countries like The Bahamas, Guyana, Jamaica among others.