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Vanessa de la Caridad Verdecía Labrada, a three-year-old girl from Holguín, passed away on Wednesday without being able to receive the bone marrow transplant she needed to survive high-risk leukemia.
The news was shared on Facebook by Verónica Dantés De Cuba and Orleydis Rodríguez, who had followed and supported the fundraising campaign for the little girl.
"Holguín is in mourning... I saw this case on social media and saw many people helping her, which made me very happy... but it really hit me hard when I found out that Vanessa is gone," they wrote.
The girl had been diagnosed with high-risk Acute Myeloid Leukemia type M4/M5, a disease that her father, Adam Verdecia, described bluntly: "There is no other treatment than a bone marrow transplant."
The medical reports from the Holguín University Pediatric Hospital confirmed that Vanessa had suffered a severe relapse. According to the publications, she presented "more than 60% infiltration of myeloid blasts in bone marrow, severe anemia, critically low platelet counts, recurrent infections, and a very delicate prognosis."
A hospital in Italy had accepted the case to perform the transplant, a procedure that Cuba does not carry out on pediatric patients and for which the country is not listed in any international donor registry.
The cost of treatment abroad ranged from 65,000 to 160,000 euros, an amount that was completely unaffordable for the family.
The alternative was to take her to Miami, where a hospital was already waiting. "Vanessa was in very critical condition. Her state did not allow her to travel on a regular flight; the family was prepared to move her via air ambulance directly to Miami," explained those who followed the case.
"In Cuba, there are practically no more medical options left to save her," the publications noted, summarizing the situation faced by dozens of Cuban families with children suffering from cancer who cannot access treatments that the health system on the Island is unable to provide.
Other voices on social media also joined in mourning. "May God take you under His mantle, princess," wrote activist Yan Cuba Nayara, founder of the humanitarian project "Luz del Corazón."
"Rest in peace, Vanessa," posted activist Noly Blak, known for organizing fundraisers and aid campaigns for people in extreme poverty or with health issues in Holguín.
This case starkly exposes the limitations of the Cuban healthcare system.
Cuba does not perform pediatric bone marrow transplants and is not listed in any international donor registry, which forces families to seek treatment abroad at costs that can range from 65,000 to 160,000 euros.
The health collapse is documented: the Ministry of Public Health acknowledged in July 2025 that only 30% of the basic medication supply is covered, and infant mortality soared to 8.2 deaths per thousand live births, compared to 3.9 in 2018, an increase of nearly 110% in seven years.
Vanessa's story is not unique. Since 2022, multiple Cuban families have had to resort to humanitarian visas or international fundraising campaigns to access transplants or other treatments that the Cuban government is unable to provide.
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