Reproductive Health Initiative
    by Diana García, Program Director

HE BIG NEWS for the beginning of the new year is the launching of MEDICC's Reproductive Health Initiative, with generous support from the General Service Foundation (GSF).  The Initiative includes the summer Reproductive Health Elective,  which begins June 18, 2000 for five weeks in Havana and outlying provinces.  The elective is open to U.S. and Canadian medical students; MPH and other health sciences students; and to those enrolled in graduate nursing and midwifery programs.  We're very pleased to be able to offer this new elective that will focus on five basic units, plus cross-cultural Spanish for Health Professionals. The application deadline is April 15, so please pass on the news to students you think might be interested.

Physician and her patient at the Ramon Gonzalez Coro Maternity Hospital.

As part of the Initiative, MEDICC Review has joined with the Cuban Journal of Public Health to issue a call for original research pieces to be submitted to a competition on the theme (broadly interpreted) of Reproductive Health Care in Cuba.  This competition is open to all Cuban professionals in health and related fields, and the jury will give priority to those articles from researchers whose practice is at the primary care or community level.  The winning articles will be published simultaneously in English and Spanish in the two journals; and their authors will receive prizes ranging from a personal computer to textbooks and individual subscriptions to US and Cuban medical and public health journals.  We believe this is one way that MEDICC can contribute to rewarding good practice and good research that is already going on in Cuba on this very important topic.  Look for these articles in the February, 2001 issue of MEDICC Review.

Financial Aid Available

Good news for MEDICC students!  Our National Office is pleased to announce  two new financial aid programs for MEDICC electives:  check the Financial Aid page on our new website to find their listings.  Thanks to the Center for Cuban Studies and Physicians for Social Responsibility for making this pledge to assist students who want to join the MEDICC program in Cuba.

During the last few months, we have also strengthened working relations with a number of national organizations in the U.S.-including the American Public Health Association (APHA) and the Association of Schools of Public Health (ASPH).  And as you'll see in The MEDICC Calendar below, we have a busy schedule of meetings this spring, bringing us into closer contact with the members of other important medical and health associations.

Springtime brings MEDICC students to Cuba.....where campuses in Havana, Pinar del Rio and Villa Clara will welcome medical residents, 4 ^th year medical students and public health students pursuing MEDICC electives.  Lastly, a reminder:  the application deadlines for MEDICC's summer electives are coming up soon!  Please pass the word.

Medical Literature Project

MEDICC's Medical Literature Project is now into its second year:  we subscribe to over 60 U.S. medical journals for Cuba's National Medical Library, and have become the number one source of their international medical literature.  The Library also welcomes back issues and collections of medical journals, as well as medical and public health textbooks.  If you would like to contribute, please turn to the webpage on the Project, or write me directly:  dgarcia@medicc.org

Cuban physicians Miguel Galindo and Julio Medina flank National Medical Association President Dr. Gary Dennis at the NMA scientific meeting (Las Vegas, August, 1999).

Professional Exchanges

Professional exchanges sponsored by MEDICC brought two Cuban physicians to the USA to present at the Annual Meeting of the National Medical Association in Las Vegas, NV.  Miguel Galindo, MD, Director of Cuba's National Immunization Program and recently awarded the PAHO prize for his work in the field, reported to conference participants that Cuba now immunizes children against 13 childhood diseases. Julio Medina, MD, Director of the Havana Treatment Facility for the Children of Chernobyl, described treatment for over 16,000 children in Cuba, victims of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.   

In related news. MEDICC co-sponsored attendance by six top Cuban nephrologists at the Annual Scientific Meeting of the American Society of Nephrology in Miami, FL, in November, thanks to gracious support from The Christopher Reynolds Foundation.

In February, associate deans, international program directors, and family medicine department heads from ten U.S. medical schools are visiting Cuba, a delegation sponsored by MEDICC to acquaint participants with our program and also give them a first-hand look at public health in Cuba.  We'll have more on their return......

And finally, last October's meeting of the MEDICC Academic Council was followed by a well-attended reception at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Labor Center, Local 1199 Health and Hospital Workers Union in New York.   A few photos tell
the story.

Silvia Wilhelm, Executive Director of Americans for Humanitarian Trade with Cuba, and Ford Foundation Program Officer Cristina Eguizábal share a moment at the MEDICC reception. Joan May, Assistant Dean at Cornell University Medical College, and Dr. Concha Mendoza, Director of the Long Island College Hospital Geriatric Dept. at the MEDICC reception (Martin Luther King, Jr. Labor Center, Local 1199, New York, Sept. 1999).

The MEDICC Calendar