Reports out of Cuba indicate that a number of doctors, nurses and other medical professionals have been interrogated by police for allegedly treating private, paying patients in public hospitals and running post-operative recovery rooms in private homes.
Personnel from the Calixto García Hospital and the Workers’ Maternity Hospital are said to be among those under investigation.
The reports focus on low paid Cuban medical personnel allegedly treating patients who pay under the table to receive better care than that available from the public health system, which is the island’s only legal option.
Elective surgeries, including a range of cosmetic plastic surgery, are also said to be commonplace – at a price.
Havana human rights activist Elizardo Sánchez said he had confirmed reports that five to 12 medical personnel had been detained for interrogation and sent home to await the prosecutors’ decisions. They were alleged to have performed relatively simple procedures, such as plastic surgeries and abortions, on paying patients in public hospitals.
The BBC correspondent in Havana, Fernando Ravsberg, noted the Calixto Garcia case and wrote that “all members of the political class have a relative or a friend who has had liposuction or received breast implants”.
A Huffington Post correspondent interviewed a woman who had reportedly received breast and buttocks implants under the covert scheme.
