Facundo is 77 years old, retired, and receives a pension of 3,000 Cuban pesos a month. That money is not enough to last him even through the first week. To eat, he goes out to find any physical work that someone offers him, regardless of the effort or the condition of his knees.
Her story was documented by Cuban filmmaker and photographer Carlos Batista in a video published on Instagram that garnered over 31,000 reactions and offers a stark portrait of old age in Cuba in 2026.
In the images, Facundo is seen shirtless and covered in reddish earth, inside an excavation, holding rocks in his hands. It’s not an exceptional scene in his life: it’s his routine.
"I am 77 years old and retired, but my pension isn’t enough for anything," he laments. "If you tell me: 'come and dig a hole for me,' I’ll dig a hole. And if you say: 'come and clear the yard for me,' I’ll clear it. 'Come and help the mason work,' I’ll go and help the mason."
And he adds with a striking honesty: "That's my life. It doesn't give me enough to live on, but well. It gives me enough to eat for two or three days."
The arithmetic of his survival is brutal. He receives 3,000 pesos in pension, with which he must cover essential expenses that include, for example, a sack of coal costing 2,000. The oil, as he himself recounts, costs 5,000 pesos. "Who lives like this?" he asks, with a mix of indignation and resignation.
Her knees are deteriorating, but she doesn't stop. "It's the legs that are in bad shape. The knees. They're the ones that are a bit bothersome. But nothing, keep moving forward," she says.
The case of Facundo is not an exception; it is the norm. According to a survey by the Independent Union Association of Cuba, 99% of the retired individuals surveyed claim that their pension does not cover food, housing, and medicine, and 90.7% of retirees work informally to survive. Additionally, 79% of those over 70 years old are unable to have three meals a day.
The regime set the minimum pension at 4,000 pesos starting September 2025, but this amount is equivalent to less than 10 dollars at the informal exchange rate and barely covers a fraction of the basic food basket, estimated between 12,000 and 30,000 pesos per person in Havana.
The official inflation reported by the National Office of Statistics and Information reached 20.70% year-on-year in July, with food contributing 63.18% of the total price increase.
This economic crisis is compounded by energy and water crises. Facundo describes it in a simplicity that requires no embellishments: "You know what it's like to go to bed without electricity, to wake up without electricity, to go to bed without water, to wake up without water." Blackouts on the Island exceed 24 hours, and do not have regular access to drinking water.
Cuba is the most aged country in Latin America: 26.7% of its population was 60 years or older by the end of 2025, with over 2.5 million people in that age group. The massive emigration of young people exacerbates the crisis: in 2025, deaths doubled births.
Facundo concludes his testimony with a phrase that sums up decades of unfulfilled promises: "I never thought my old age would be like this."
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