Cuban opposition leader José Daniel Ferrer resorted to a powerful medical metaphor this Tuesday to explain why a significant portion of Cubans prefers direct military intervention over the indefinite maintenance of economic sanctions against the regime: communism is cancer, sanctions are chemotherapy, and intervention would be the surgery that removes the ailment at its root.
Ferrer made these statements during a live interview with Tania Costa, one day after participating in the event "Cuba Libre: The Oppression That Havana Hides", organized by the U.S. mission to the UN and Archivo Cuba at the United Nations headquarters in New York, where representatives of the regime put on a show filled with vulgarity, shouting, and homophobic gestures.
"Sanctions are like chemotherapy. Imagine a body that has two options: communist cancer and chemotherapy for life, with the adverse reactions, with the side effects of chemotherapy: hair loss, vomiting, headaches, nausea, dizziness, etc. There are patients who say: let the cancer kill me, don't give me that anymore," stated the founder of the Unión Patriótica de Cuba (UNPACU).
The opposition leader clarified that he does not reject sanctions as a tool, but rather their indefinite prolongation without a definitive outcome. "I want cancer to be eradicated, but I don't want chemotherapy to last forever, accompanying the patient for their entire life. If surgery, after a certain period of chemotherapy, can remove it and it is known that the removal of cancer will eliminate all cancerous cells and will not lead to metastasis again, then surgery is welcomed."
Ferrer’s conclusion was straightforward: "That is why there are so many people in Cuba who prefer intervention over sanctions."
The immediate context of these words is the annual voting of the UN General Assembly regarding the Cuban resolution calling for an end to the U.S. embargo, scheduled for October 27-29.
Ferrer and the UNPACU are part of an opposition coalition that surpassed 1,000 endorsements and on October 14 made a call to democratic countries to vote against or abstain from this resolution, arguing that the regime uses it to portray itself as a victim of foreign aggression and to divert attention from political repression and military control of the economy.
In the 2025 vote, the Cuban resolution received 165 votes in favor, seven against, and 12 abstentions; Argentina, Ukraine, and Hungary voted against for the first time.
Ferrer's statements also arise from the incident the previous day at the UN, where Cuban diplomats led by Ambassador Ernesto Soberón staged a protest in the hallways of the building, shouting "terrorists" and "get out of the UN" at the panelists, among whom was also the artist and former political prisoner Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara.
Regarding that reaction, Ferrer was scathing: "You have to be an idiot to behave that way at the United Nations. They can do that in Havana, in Santiago de Cuba, in Mar Verde prison, in Boniato prison, in the Combinado del Este. Because that is what we know they have always done."
The upcoming vote in the UN General Assembly, scheduled for the end of October, will be the first concrete test to determine whether the opposition's call manages to undermine the international support that the Cuban regime has garnered for over three decades with that resolution.
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