Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum praises providers from Cuban medical doctors, who typically work in underserved rural areas.
Revealed On 25 Mar 2026
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has confirmed that her nation will proceed receiving Cuban medical employees, as a part of a longstanding programme meant to construct goodwill between the island and different Latin American nations.
Her remarks on Wednesday come as the US pressures Latin American nations to sever their ties to Cuba’s medical programme.
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Sheinbaum, nevertheless, advised reporters throughout a information convention that the settlement was a profit to Mexico. Hundreds of Cuban medical employees have deployed there since 2022 to work largely in poor, rural areas.
“We have now an excellent settlement that’s additionally been an excellent assist to us. It’s a bilateral settlement that’s been very useful for Mexico,” stated Sheinbaum.
“It’s onerous to get Mexican medical doctors and specialists to exit to many rural areas the place we want medical specialists, and the Cubans are prepared to work there.”
In February, the US handed a regulation that opens the door to sanctions on nations that proceed to take part within the programme.
It known as for the US secretary of state to difficulty a report inside 90 days about which nations proceed to pay the federal government of Cuba for the “coerced and trafficked labour of Cuban medical professionals”.
The transfer comes amid a wider push to additional isolate Cuba and topple the federal government in Havana, a longtime goal of US ire. To this point, nations together with the Bahamas, Honduras, Guatemala, Jamaica and Guyana have ended their participation within the Cuban medical alternate programme.
Cuba has lengthy depicted the decades-old programme as a way of signalling solidarity with different nations. It has additionally change into an necessary supply of international income for the island nation, which has been below a restrictive US financial embargo since 1960.
The administration of US President Donald Trump, nevertheless, has depicted the programme as akin to compelled labour.
“Mainly, it’s human trafficking,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio advised reporters in February.
“I imply, they’re barely even being paid. Their freedom of motion is tightly restricted. And we would like these nations to know that’s what they’re collaborating in.”
Specialists on the United Nations have additionally raised related considerations, together with in regards to the confiscation of passports, which the Cuban authorities justifies as a way of stopping skilled medical doctors from fleeing the nation after their state-sponsored research.
The strain on the Cuban medical missions is a part of a broader push below Trump’s second time period to hunt regime change on the island.
By threatening tariffs on Cuba’s buying and selling companions, Trump has largely reduce the island off from accessing the international oil essential to energy its electrical grid.
Trump has additionally stated that he hopes to “take” Cuba and set up a brand new authorities that will probably be extra pliant to US calls for.
The Mexican authorities has tried to stability its pleasant relations with Cuba with the US’s calls for.
Within the absence of vitality shipments, Sheinbaum’s authorities has despatched vessels with humanitarian support to the island.
