A 49-year-old doctor from Havana became the first health worker to die of covid-19 in Cuba since the island reported the first cases of the virus in March 2020, authorities reported Thursday.
He is the “first doctor to die (on the island)” and “unquestionably for all Cubans, it is a hard blow,” said Cuba’s Health Ministry chief of epidemiology Francisco Durán, conveying his condolences to the relatives and friends of the deceased.
In his usual televised press conference to report on the pandemic’s progress, Durán specified that the doctor, who lived in Havana, contracted the virus in his community and “wasn’t exactly working in the red zone, which is the most common” .
The doctor, one of four deaths from the coronavirus reported by Cuba on Thursday, had the first symptoms of covid-19 on December 30 and “ in its evolution presented a group of mostly respiratory complications, ” including unfavorably, “added the expert.
He died Wednesday “of multi-organ dysfunction, after experiencing cardiac arrest unresponsive to CPR maneuvers.”
Durán himself reported the deaths of three Cuban nurses and a doctor from the coronavirus in October, but while on collaborative missions outside the island.
The expert then stated that none of the three were part of the Henry Reeve contingent, specializing in natural disasters and epidemics, of which Cuba has sent 55 brigades to 40 countries to combat the pandemic.
Cuba had recorded a low number of infections, but after the Christmas celebrations and the increased influx of tourists and Cubans living abroad, the number of cases rose rapidly with a record Tuesday of 825 positive covid-19.
Yet the island, with a population of 11.2 million, is one of the least affected countries in the region, with 24,105 infections, 208 deaths and 19,050 recovered.