Maura, an anesthesiologist with decades of professional experience, walks the streets of Camagüey carrying bags full of cans that she collects one by one to sell as recyclable raw material in order to survive.
His story was shared on Facebook by the activist Christian Arbolaez (text) and David Vela (video), and it moved thousands of people due to the stark contrast between his professional background and his current situation.
According to the post by Arbolaez on Facebook, Maura is 73 years old, continues to work despite having already submitted her retirement, but neither her salary nor her pension is sufficient to meet her basic needs.
Anesthesiology is one of the most demanding and well-paid medical specialties in the world, but in Cuba, its practitioners earn between 5,000 and 8,000 Cuban pesos (CUP) per month, equivalent to about ten to twenty dollars at the informal exchange rate.
The basic basket for two people exceeds 41,000 CUP per month, which means that a specialist doctor's salary covers less than 20% of what is needed to feed a family.
Maura's two daughters also followed the path of medicine: one is a doctor and the other a nurse. A whole family dedicated for decades to caring for the health of others, and yet reality drove Maura to go out searching for cans on the street.
Those who found her during these days were impressed not only by her story but also by her calmness and grace. A couple stopped to give her money; she thanked them with poise and continued on her way, carrying the bags in her hand.
"It hurts to see how a woman with so much training and so many values ends up searching for cans to be able to eat. It hurts because we are not talking about someone who didn't want to work. We are talking about a highly qualified specialist," wrote Arbolaez.
Maura's case is not isolated. A Cuban doctor demonstrated how she spends her entire salary in just one day, and similar cases of professionals living in poverty have been documented in recent months.
Retirement pensions, even after the adjustment in September 2025, do not exceed 4,000 CUP per month, an amount that barely covers a minimal fraction of basic needs. Prior to that adjustment, the minimum pension was only 1,528 CUP, less than five dollars.
The crisis in the healthcare sector is further exacerbated by the fact that the Cuban state maintains over 24,000 exported doctors in 56 countries as a source of foreign currency, while the internal system collapses. In 2024, the number of doctors in Cuba decreased by 5,399 compared to the previous year.
Cuban Vice President Salvador Valdés Mesa acknowledged in February 2025 that "it is not possible to live on a salary of 6,000 pesos," an admission that has not led to any structural solutions for workers in the sector.
Arbolaez concluded his publication with a question that encapsulates the outrage of those who knew Maura's story: "How is it possible that a 73-year-old anesthesiologist has to collect cans to survive?"
Filed under: