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An elderly man, 78 years old, a war veteran and member of the Cuban Revolution Combatants Association (ACRC), is agonizing without medical care in Guanabacoa, Havana, while the Cuban regime denies him medications and healing materials. The report was made by the opposition figure and former political prisoner José Díaz Silva, who documented the case in a public post in which he demands immediate attention for the veteran.
José García López fell ill with chikungunya and suffered a fall while lying down, which worsened his condition to the point of being critical.
When activists obtained a medical certificate at the local clinic to present it at the Julio Antonio Mella Polyclinic in Guanabacoa and request supplies for their treatments, the response was blunt: "there was nothing."
The paradox is striking: according to the whistleblowers, there are warehouses in Guanabacoa filled with medical supplies while sick and disabled veterans are left to fend for themselves.
Today, those who are humanly supporting García López are not the State he served, but rather activists from the Democracy Movement (MD), the Opponents for a New Republic Movement (MONR), the Assembly of the Cuban Resistance (ARC), and promoters of Cuba Decide.
"It is outrageous that those who once dedicated their lives and health to the system are now treated worse than animals, forgotten and condemned to suffering," wrote Díaz Silva in his statement.
The ACRC card of García López, photographed over his bandaged limb, bears the signature of the late Commander of the Revolution Juan Almeida Bosque, who was the founding president of the organization for sixteen years.
Díaz Silva is a well-known figure in the Cuban opposition. A leader of the MONR and the Democracy Movement, he was arrested in March 2022 and sentenced to two years of corrective labor. He arrived in Miami in exile on December 24, 2022 with a humanitarian visa, under the threat of imprisonment if he returned to Cuba. From exile, he continues to document human rights violations on the island.
The case of García López is not isolated. In January 2023, Rigoberto Sarmiento Guerrero, a combatant of the Rebel Army and founder of the PCC, 86 years old, spent 21 days bedridden without medical attention or a visit from the ACRC in Holguín. In April of this year, the son of a Cuban combatant in Angola reported that his father's body had been left unburied for over 24 hours in the Moa Cemetery due to negligence from the authorities.
The collapse of the healthcare system exacerbates neglect. The Minister of Public Health, José Ángel Portal Miranda, himself admitted that 461 out of the 651 medications in the Basic Medicine List are missing, leaving only 30% of the essentials available. The polyclinics lack basic supplies such as syringes and surgical materials.
Veterans of Angola, for their part, receive pensions ranging from 1,500 to 2,000 Cuban pesos per month —equivalent to less than four dollars on the informal exchange— which are insufficient to cover basic needs.
"José García López survives thanks to the solidarity help of brothers and activists, because medications in Cuba are unaffordable for the people," concluded Díaz Silva, who demands from the world "immediate medical attention, medications, and humane conditions" for the elderly colonel.
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