A Cuban man identified as Miguel Ángel pleaded for help in a heartbreaking video posted on Facebook to avoid starving to death after surviving for three days on nothing but plantains.
"David, look, I went to your house to look for you because I've been eating plantains for three days because I don’t have money to buy food," says Miguel Ángel at the beginning of the video, recorded by David Vela, an acquaintance of his who came to his house upon learning about the situation.
"Barely a plantain, I have nothing else. I beg the whole world to help me, do not let me die of hunger because of the need I have," adds the man, his voice broken, torso exposed, and body visibly emaciated by illness and hunger.
Miguel Ángel cannot work. He suffers from diabetes, severe circulation problems, and tumors in his feet. Additionally, he has undergone two abdominal surgeries. His physical condition, extremely thin, is evident in every second of the video.
"What I have on my feet are tumors that are gradually bothering me because of my circulation issues; I am sick with circulation problems, diabetic, and I underwent two surgeries in my abdomen," the man explains.
David Vela, who recorded and published the video, described his acquaintance's situation in few words: "He is starving, and he isn't asking for riches or anything; what he wants is food. He is really in a bad way."
Miguel Ángel's plea is as simple as it is urgent: "I don't want wealth, what I want is to eat, food, eat, look how thin I am, food."
Vela published his WhatsApp number so that anyone wishing to help can contact him directly.
The case of Miguel Ángel is not an exception. Cuba is going through the worst food crisis in its recent history, with 96.91% of the population lacking adequate access to food, according to data from the Food Monitor Program of 2024. Seven out of ten Cubans skip at least one meal daily; among those over 61 years old, the figure rises to eight out of ten.
Elderly individuals and those with chronic illnesses, like Miguel Ángel, are the most vulnerable. Minimum pensions do not exceed 4,000 Cuban pesos, which is less than 10 dollars in the informal market, while rice costs over 400 CUP per pound and oil can reach 2,000 CUP per liter. In this context, the burro banana has become the only food accessible to many, just as happened with an elderly man in Santiago de Cuba in 2023 who survived solely on that fruit.
In April of this year, a hypertensive woman and her son with a mental illness in Holguín went three days without food. Deaths from malnutrition in Cuba increased by 74% between 2022 and 2023, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights warned in June of this year about the accelerated worsening of the humanitarian crisis on the island.
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