By Ing. Yayah A.B. Conteh
It is remarkable and amazing that a group of medical practitioners, from a small country seemingly sandwiched between North and South America in the Caribbean Sea, has been providing hope and inspiration to millions of people around the world.
This group constitutes the Cuban doctors and nurses who are part of the Henry Reeve International Medical Brigade now working in 27 countries to help fight and eradicate Covid-19.
One philanthropic American, at age 19 who left his home in Brooklyn, New York, in the late 1800s to join the Cuban struggle for liberation against the Spanish colonizers of the Island, was Henry Reeve.
It was the late Cuban Revolutionary leader, Fidel Castro who, in 2005, named the Brigade after him. This followed after the US rejected an offer to send 1,500 Cuban doctors to provide medical assistance in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, which caused untold destruction and claimed thousands of lives in some states within the North American continent itself.
Over 2,000 doctors, nurses and medical professionals from Cuba have been collaborating in 27 countries affected by the coronavirus. The Cubans have thus demonstrated a remarkable display of international co-operation in saving thousands, if not millions, of lives worldwide by putting their own well-being at risk. And in their almost 15 years of history it is recorded that more than 7,000 health professionals have been part of the Brigade.
What characterizes the Nobel Peace Prize are selflessness, solidarity and working for the common good of humanity.
Indeed, it is quite comfortable and reassuring that these traits aptly describe the Henry Reeve International Medical Brigade, which has saved over 80,000 lives since its formation in 2005, and has been equally fighting the Covid-19 in 27 countries worldwide as of May 1, 2020.
These countries comprise of Andora, Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Beliz, Cape Verde, Dominica, Grenada, Haiti, Honduras, Italy, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Qatar, Saint Lucia, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, South Africa, Suriname, Togo and Venezuela.
And, even as I write, there are 16 Cuban medical practitioners including doctors and nurses who recently landed on the shores of Sierra Leone to help fight the Covid-19.
In recognition therefore of their heroic efforts, commitment and dedication in saving millions of lives in Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean and Asia hit by earthquakes, hurricanes and epidemics, and have even gone further to dozens of countries affected by the Covid-19, a campaign was mounted on the 16th of June, 2020, in order to award the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize to the Henry Reeve International Medical Brigade.
This campaign and petition was launched in France and has been endorsed by more than 200 organizations around the world.
The campaign has been endorsed by prominent intellectuals, politicians, artists and ordinary citizens from around the world who have recognized the outstanding contribution of the Brigade to human health and life generally. In fact, the campaign that is yearning for the Nobel Peace Prize nomination for Cuban doctors in honour of praising their international effort during the coronavirus outbreak has recently reached nearly 30,000 signatories. It is asserted that it has a goal of reaching 35,000 signatories.
Co-ordinated by the Cuban Ministry of Public Health, the Henry Reeve International Medical Brigade is only one part of the Cuban Medical System, which has sent more healthcare workers abroad than the entire World Health Organization.
The Henry Reeve Medical Brigade has travelled as far afield as Pakistan where it experienced a devastating earthquake. They have even gone as far as Honduras, a government that has always remained hostile and insensitive to the Cuban government.
Let it be borne in mind that Cuba has the largest Medical Training Centre in the world – a Training Centre that is virtually free and accessible to all who crave for its services and facilities.
From the time of its inception, the medical personnel of the Brigade now boasts of a staff strength of 7,400 volunteer health care workers who have always been in the frontline administering medical attention as and when the need arises and providing disaster relief as well.
Even before the emergence of the Covid-19, this Brigade had treated more than 3.5 million people in 27 countries ravaged by the world’s worst natural disasters and epidemics.
In a desperate effort to combat the dangerous EBOLA pandemic, the Brigade sent more than 400 doctors, nurses and other health care workers to West Africa, which constituted one of their most heroic acts between the years 2014 and 2015.
The team at that time constituted the single largest medical operation on the ground in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia. They applied their expertise in regions where health care facilities and even basic infrastructure such as motorable roads and communication systems were virtually lacking.
In 2017, the World Health Organization (WHO) awarded them the prestigious Dr. Lee Jong-Wook Memorial Prize for Public Health in recognition of the work of these specialists.
Defenders of this Brigade claim that since the world is now suffering from a devastating pandemic, it has been working globally to try to keep the spread of the virus at bay and to also care for those who are afflicted by same.
The world stood aghast not too long ago to see the Cubans going off to the most infected part of Italy, Lombardy, to help sustain the lives of its inhabitants.
Irrespective of the infamous blockade imposed on Cuba by the US, which has lasted for more than half a century, Cuba has continued to display an unbroken spirit of solidarity by sending its army of medical practitioners in white coats around the planet to face and confront the impact of the pandemic.
The website pinpoints that Cuba is the only country that has shown genuine internationalism during this corona virus crisis. It goes further to highlight that ‘The heroic effort of the Cuban doctors in this pandemic is not just the medical expert that they are bringing to many parts of the world but also their great solidarity and love for humanity”.
Join us then in asking the Nobel Committee to award Cuba’s Henry Reeve International Medical Brigade a Nobel Peace Prize for the forthcoming year, 2021.
They truly deserve and merit it!
Ing. Yayah A.B. Conteh is the Director of the Mechanical Services Department (MSD) of the Sierra Leone Roads Authority (SLRA).
Tel. Nos: 076640364 /077718805.
E-mail: contehyayahab2020@gmail.com.