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A report from the Cuban Citizen Audit Observatory (OCAC) published this Monday shakes the official figures regarding the current health crisis in Cuba.
The study estimates that at least 8,700 people have died from arboviruses such as dengue, chikungunya, and the oropouche virus.
It is a figure 185 times higher than the 47 deaths acknowledged by the Ministry of Public Health of Cuba (MINSAP) until mid-December (although that number was later updated to 55).
"They lie again, as they did during COVID-19", the document claims, accusing the Cuban government of deliberately concealing the magnitude of the tragedy.
An estimate based on official figures and international criteria
Paradoxically, the projections from the OCAC are based on data acknowledged by the Cuban authorities themselves, such as the percentage of infections.
The national director of Epidemiology, Dr. Francisco Durán, admitted on television that 30% of the population -approximately 2.9 million people- had fallen ill during the syndemic.
Based on this figure, the report estimates three scenarios of lethality:
Scenario A (low lethality, 0.1%): 2,900 deaths, a figure 61 times greater than the initial official count.
Scenario B (moderate lethality, 0.3–0.5%): between 8,700 and 14,500 deaths. This is the scenario that the report considers to be the most realistic for Cuba, given the hospital overcrowding and the conditions of malnutrition and co-infection.
Scenario C (high lethality, 1%): up to 29,000 deaths in the worst imaginable context.
"What is impossible is that the number is reduced to the 47 deceased officially recognized by the Cuban government up to mid-December. The reality would be, at a minimum, 185 times greater," states the report.
The healthcare system: Statistics on the collapse
The data presented in the report depict a healthcare system in ruins, the result of years of underinvestment and the prioritization of other sectors, particularly tourism, managed by the military conglomerate GAESA
Between 2021 and 2024, Cuba lost more than 30,000 doctors and 15,000 nurses.
More than 7,000 hospital beds have been eliminated.
By January 2025, 64% of the medications that BioCubaFarma was supposed to deliver were not available.
The shortage of pediatric syrups, intravenous solutions, reagents, and antipyretics has rendered the clinics non-operational.
Medical attention, according to multiple testimonies gathered, is limited to general diagnoses with no real capacity for confirmation or treatment: the "unspecified febrile syndrome" has become a catch-all that conceals the true nature of the outbreak.
Statistical Manipulation: The Invisible Death
The OCAC documents systematic practices of underreporting and manipulation of death certificates.
Interviewed healthcare professionals explain that they receive instructions not to report viral infections as a previous cause, which erases any trace of arboviral diseases in the official statistics.
"That is what should be done from a basic ethical standpoint. The real objective is to distort epidemiological statistics," stated one of the interviewed doctors.
This mechanism was already reported during the COVID-19 pandemic, and now it is repeating itself with the current syndemic. The result is a distorted public perception and a delayed or non-existent governmental response.
The perfect environment for a devastating epidemic
The report also highlights the environmental and social context as a significant aggravating factor.
The chronic accumulation of garbage, the proliferation of mosquito breeding sites, prolonged blackouts, water shortages, and food insecurity have created the perfect conditions for viral spread.
In Havana, more than 30% of the garbage is not collected and remains on the streets, creating breeding grounds.
Only 15% of the Cuban population manages to have three meals a day, according to estimates from the OCAC.
Inflation, malnutrition, and sustained stress have weakened the collective immune system.
"The disease has spread not only because the virus is present, but because it found a country that isCollapsed in every sense," stated one of the interviewed specialists.
Invisible consequences, untreated disability
Beyond the deaths, the OCAC warns about the lasting effects of chikungunya, which can include chronic joint pain, severe fatigue, respiratory difficulties, and neurological damage.
In other countries, these consequences are addressed with physical therapy, specific pain relievers, and multidisciplinary care.
In Cuba, those tools do not exist. The result: young people become disabled with no rehabilitation, no medication, and no financial resources to cope with daily suffering.
"People of working age become partially or totally incapacitated without access to extended sick leave, disability pensions, or rehabilitation therapies," summarizes the report.
Testimonies that refute the State
The report intertwines technical data with personal stories that contradict the official narrative:
In Ciego de Ávila, Isiel Díaz Vera, a healthy young man, died from respiratory complications associated with the virus. He was never counted as a victim.
In Holguín, a 42-year-old woman died while waiting for an ambulance that never arrived.
In Havana, a mother recounts: "We spent the entire month of October sick. First the child, then my husband, then me. No one attended to us, but we ended up all right. Others weren't so lucky."
Conclusion: A health crisis as a reflection of the state's collapse
For the Cuban Observatory of Citizen Audit, the health emergency is the most visible reflection of the structural collapse of the Cuban political and economic system.
It is not an accidental event, but rather a catastrophe built upon deliberate decisions, indifference to citizen suffering, and an institutional culture that prioritizes propaganda over human life.
"The true achievements of the Cuban model are not hospitals or statistics, but the systematic silencing of the victims," the document concludes.
While the government insists that arboviruses are "reporting in a stable manner" and that the lethality is low, the data, the testimonies, and the reality in the neighborhoods tell a much darker, tragic, and silenced story.
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