Get Better in Cuba

If you have diabetes or lung cancer grab a raft and paddle your way to Cuba. You can’t take a flight there because they beat you up on flights now. You can’t get good health care in America because our lawmakers are having beer parties celebrating that they have achieved 1/3^rd approval to cut about 26  million people from health care that won’t be covered for treatment either. In Cuba you will take a cab to the hospital in a well   kept classic car from the 1950’s and get a vaccine that will add at least ten years and more to your life. Only 10 years so far because the vaccine has only been available for the past 10 years. It will   stop the disease from spreading to your probably amputated limbs if treated in America, and clear your lungs so you can breathe again without coughing. Besides, the music in Cuba is uplifting too. Thanks to Obama, relations with Cuba has softened and only now are they trying clinical trials in America to see if these treatments can be approved in this country. To me the proof is in all the people of Cuba who are living good quality longer lives despite that their main products are sugar and tobacco.

Lung cancer and diabetes are only the beginning. There is the potential for an entire range of  Cuban drugs for breast cancer and even brain cancer to be used. In Cuba they also do a service to their communities that has never been done here in America. A doctor and his team will go door to door and give evaluations to each and every member in that home. That is what I call room service!

In 2016 Obama became the first President to visit Cuba in nearly 90 years. He created the loosening of trade and travel restrictions to Cuba. What most people don’t know is that it also made it accessible for Americans to receive widespread medical advancements there. The door to door service that doctors provide is essential to the health care successes there. They can focus on preventative treatments by catching diseases before they do too much damage to your body. In America all too often people drag themselves to the doctor when it is too late to save their bodies. The costs are low and they are contributing to longevity in Cuba. Life expectancy in Cuba matches that in America but it costs less than one tenth of what we spend in America per capita.

While most of Cuba might look like it is stuck in the 1950’s their medicine is not. Cuba is producing more doctors than any other place in the world. The infant mortality rate is better than the numbers in America. As a small Communist country their health care system was built out of necessity. The 1960 trade embargo restricted Cuba from importing medicines from America so they had to develop cures and treatments on their own. Now they are at the forefront in innovation and inexpensive treatments. Their Diabetes drug Heberprot is eliminating 70% of diabetes related amputations there. It is a drug that heals foot ulcers and prevents amputations. Heberprot stimulates tissue growth and makes you heal quickly. In America they amputate your limbs.

Hundreds of thousands of people from 20 countries have saved their limbs thanks to Heberprot developed in Cuba. Anyone who has had to have a limb amputated could only expect another 4 or 5 years of life due to depression and the  problems associated with mobility without your limbs. So, the treatment is saving limbs and saving lives. That is enough of a “clinical” trial for me!

The United States has 30 million people suffering from diabetes. Because of the long standing trade embargo, Heberprot can not be used in America despite its excellent track record in the treatment of diabetes. Since we live in a global society it is time to keep politics out of our medicines and needs to help people all over the world!

It is not just medicines. All Cuban products have been banned for over 50 years. Their most famous exports are sugar and cigars. They know how to treat complications from over use of those products. Lung Cancer is the number one cancer in the world. Half of those diagnosed die within one year. Cuba has a life changing treatment for lung cancer. Cimavax is a lung cancer vaccine recently developed in Cuba. People suffering from stage 4 lung Cancer who are told they have less than one year to live are seeing a reversal in their Cancer and living ten years longer and counting with this new drug treatment. Cimavax is a vaccine that targets the immune system that stumps tumor growth. It was developed at the Center for Molecular Pulmonology and treated more than 5,000 patients. After 5 years 25% of the patients are still alive. It is impressive that any of them are still alive. So pack your bags and find your way to Cuba and bring your diseased body there for life saving cheap treatment. Yes, good health care is hard to find these days.

Dr. Kelvin Lee head of Immunology at Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Western New York in Buffalo, is the first doctor to attempt to bring this treatment to America.  Before clinical trials for FDA approval can be done here, additional road blocks must be overcome because permission must be given from the U.S. Treasury Department who must grant an exemption from the Trade Embargo. Political red tape must be stopped when saving lives is concerned! So make your raft to Cuba! Cimavax is now being tested in the treatments for colon cancer, head and neck cancer and prostate cancer. There is a whole range of Cuban drugs waiting to be used around the world to treat breast   and brain cancer too if only political differences could be put aside. We could all benefit from Cuba’s low cost and beneficial treatments.