Raibel David Gómez Santana, a 10-month-old Cuban baby from Sancti Spíritus, died this Friday without having been able to receive the urgently needed liver transplant, as confirmed by activist Yamilka Lafita on Facebook with a mourning image.
"Unfortunately, baby Raibel is no longer with us. Another victim of this macabre system that paid with his life for not being the child of any of them... This kind of news devastates me. Thank you all," wrote Crofs in his post.
The case became public on May 25, when the child's father went to seek help from the activist Yureibys Torresilla from Sancti Spíritus.
Raibel David suffered from biliary atresia without a gallbladder or common bile duct, a congenital disease that obstructs the flow of bile to the intestine and causes progressive liver damage.
The Kasai surgery performed on him failed, and the baby showed severe liver failure with ascites, edema, and ocular jaundice.
His father, Raudelvis Gómez Carabeo, was straightforward: "What he needs is an urgent liver transplant. It cannot be done in Cuba."
Both the father and the mother were compatible to donate part of their liver. "We are both compatible; whoever is needed will donate a portion," the father stated in May.
The obstacle was not medical, but bureaucratic: without an acceptance letter from Hospital La Paz de Madrid, the Spanish Consulate would not grant the humanitarian visa, a process that the family was never able to complete in time.
The solidarity that the case invoked was widespread, but insufficient. The campaign grew on social media for days without the Cuban regime providing any solution.
The death of Raibel David is not an isolated case. In less than a year, at least two Cuban babies have lost their lives due to being unable to access a liver transplant.
The first was Rafael Junior Chávez Carrera, eight months old, who died on June 29, 2025 at the William Soler Pediatric Hospital in Havana, also with his mother as a compatible donor and also without a transplant.
The most painful contrast is provided by the case of Amanda Lemus Ortiz, diagnosed with the same illness.
Thanks to a solidarity campaign and without support from the Cuban government, she arrived in Madrid in March 2024, was operated on for free at Hospital La Paz, and in January 2026 celebrated her fourth birthday with an exemplary recovery.
His story shows that a transplant is viable when the transfer arrives on time, which makes Raibel David's death even more devastating.
Cuba does not have an active pediatric liver transplant program.
The regime has attempted to justify the health collapse by attributing it to the U.S. embargo, while the infant mortality rate increased by 148% between 2018 and 2025, according to data acknowledged by the Cuban authorities themselves last May.
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