Govt. to pursue longer-term partnership with Cuba for more nurses, healthcare workers in the future
PLYMOUTH, MONTSERRAT — Scores of Cuban nurses who were brought into the country to assist in its fight against COVID-19 during the peak of the pandemic two years ago headed home yesterday, signaling the end of the global crisis could be well on its way.
In a statement thanking the nurses for joining Montserrat’s front lines in its time of need, the government said, “The Ministry of Health and Social Services is today bidding farewell to the Cuban health professionals who have provided specialists and support services to the government and people of Montserrat since 2020.
“The first team arrived in July 2020 as part of an agreement between the government of Montserrat and Cuba to provide support to the health sector during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
A team of Cuban nurses and healthcare workers brought to Montserrat to aid its fight against COVID-19 in July 2020. (Photo: Twitter @BrunoRguezP)
Montserrat was not alone in reinforcing its healthcare system with foreign workers shortly after the lethal coronavirus first struck the Caribbean in early 2020.
Countless other nations in the region also brought in nurses from around the globe to shore up healthcare workforces that were battling unprecedented exhaustion, illness and even death due to COVID-19 exposures.
With healthcare workers in “abnormally” high demand over the course of the pandemic’s throes, countries like Jamaica and The Bahamas hired Cuban nurses, while Barbados hired nurses from Ghana.
The government of Montserrat acknowledged this, noting, “The Republic of Cuba would have sent medics all over the world to assist with the COVID-19 pandemic and Montserrat has benefitted from this.”
Not a permanent goodbye
A group of healthcare workers.
With the Cuban nurses who had been stationed in Montserrat heading home, it could be one more indicator of a return to “normal” around the world.
Recently, countries the globe over have begun slowly moving towards a concept of “post-COVID”, relaxing long-held restrictions like mask wearing and social distancing, and even ending work-from-home mandates in some cases.
But the government of Montserrat maintained this is not the end of its pursuit for foreign healthcare workers.
“As the team leaves us,” it noted, “we will continue to engage with the Republic of Cuba to develop a longer-term arrangement for the provision of medical personnel.
“The government of Montserrat would like to convey its appreciation to the doctors and nurses and the Republic of Cuba for their services to the people of Montserrat.”
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