Condom crisis in Cuba: Up to more than 100 pesos per unit in the informal market

Thecondom crisis in Cuba continues to escalate and these are sold for up to more than 100 pesos per unit in the informal market ofHoly Spirit, according to local official press.

“Condoms have not entered since March 17, 2022. On that occasion only 54,000 condoms entered, out of a plan of 2,809,078 units, so it only provided coverage for seven days. "It was an insufficient number," admitted this Monday the director of the Provincial Pharmacy and Optical Company, Damaris Zabalo Calero, to the official media.Escambray from the central province of the island.

The report also recognizes that given the zero supply of condoms in the state network of pharmacies, the only option is in the informal condom market that has proliferated in that province since 2020, when the shortage of the means of protection broke out.

Likewise, he states that this trade is nourished by those who import the product and sell it “at the price imposed by their profits.

"The most cautious, then, to have sex will have to pay at least 50 pesos for a condom - although up to more than 100 pesos have been quoted, they say, when the offers were less abundant - and this also threatens its effective use," the aforementioned medium emphasizes.

In addition, they point out that the condom crisis dates back to the year the coronavirus pandemic began on the island, since at that time the local health authorities recognized that in January 2020 they had received the product and until September of that year they returned. to acquire the same, about 51,000 units, an amount well below the needs.

According to the Pharmacies and Opticians company, in that province around “334,500 condoms are needed per month, of which 70%, some 234,090 units, are distributed through the territory's pharmacy network. And such a figure has not been found again, not even on paper.”

At the end of 2022, the Provincial Health Directorate in that province reported that the decrease in the numbers of cases with Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STD) was “discrete” and that there was even an increase in people infected with syphilis, especially in Cabaiguán, in addition to more patients detected with gonorrhea in the municipalities of Jatibonico, Cabaiguán and Fomento, the aforementioned note points out.

Last May, it was also known thatSTDs had increased in the province of Artemisa due to the shortage of condoms and their high prices.

The official newspaperArtemiseno He noted on that occasion that since the first quarter of 2021, Artemisa pharmacies had not received condoms and that a report from the provincial Public Health Directorate exposed the increase in STD diagnoses in 2022.

Furthermore, they said that during that year theHIV/AIDS epidemic maintained an upward trend since its beginnings in 1986.

In 2022, cases ofherpe simple, condyloma andsyphilis, the latter present in all municipalities, with more incidence in Bahía Honda, San Cristóbal, Bauta and Artemisa.

Other provinces where an increase in cases of sexually transmitted diseases is reported areSantiago de Cuba andGuantanamo. In that eastern territory, what has been detected the most is vaginal discharge syndrome, syphilis and the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).

Cuba does not produce condoms so it depends on their import or donations from international organizations, as the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) did in March 2023, whichcontributed almost two million condoms to the country.