Guatemala City/Prensa Latina
A representation of the 1,117 Guatemalan doctors trained in Cuba shared life stories in the department of San Marcos on Sunday, on the occasion of the 25 years of ELAM.
The ambassador of the largest Caribbean island in this nation, Nazario Fernández, expressed to the attendees his joy at being able to be at this meeting held with such dedication and which he considered a patriotic act.
We commemorate Cuban Culture Day, a historical date that is October 20, 1868, when the mambisa force at the beginning of the fight for independence sang the Cuban National Anthem for the first time, he explained.
Called the Second National Meeting of Doctors Graduated from the Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM) and with the presence of the rector of that house of higher studies, Yoandra Muro, the diplomat considered that “we are twinned in history.”
With the participation also via videoconference of Cuba’s white-coated professionals in the land of the quetzal, Fernández stressed that it is a happy coincidence.
He dedicated his first thought in an activity like this to the Commander in Chief of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, “inspirator and main protagonist of this wonderful human work.”
He recalled that it was the doctors, the brigade that arrived on November 5, 1998 to provide solidarity aid under the onslaught of Hurricane Mitch, who opened this page.
Furthermore, he added, then Cuban doctors went to Honduras and Nicaragua, but the only one that arrived under those circumstances and stayed uninterruptedly and is now turning 26 years old is the brigade in Guatemala.
“We are moved when you talk about your experiences, your life stories, but also when we listen to you sharing the experiences and values in caring for such humble people,” reflected the ambassador.
In the case of the doctors of the largest of the Antilles, they leave enriched not only professionally but spiritually from the villages, from the communities, from all the places where they fulfill their mission.
As a proverb says, he noted, love is repaid with love and that is what we celebrate.
You all have an identity, and this is based on values, you are doctors of science and conscience, he emphasized.
The Guatemalan doctors from ELAM took advantage of the occasion to condemn the blockade imposed by the United States on the Island for 62 years.
Before the activity, Fernández visited the collaborators from the distant department of San Marcos, in the company of Muro and the head of the brigade in the country, Mariheta Cutiño.
Last Friday night, a small group of white-coated professionals who graduated from that center located in Havana held a previous meeting in which they highlighted the solidarity, brotherhood and morality of Cuba.
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