Let’s Hear It for Socialized Medicine!

Cuba will soon begin inoculating its citizens — and the populations of poor countries so far overlooked by Big Pharma, and even tourists. The small, poor island nation has succeeded in developing a Covid-19 vaccine — which it proudly calls “Sovereign” — because the Cuban government has invested deeply in biotech research and development along with its world-class public health system. Now the only obstacle to Cuba producing even more life-saving vaccinations for struggling nations is the U.S. economic blockade, which limits the flow of laboratory equipment and raw supplies necessary for the mass production of the Sovereign shot.

This is one more Cold War relic — and retro measure from the Trump era — that President Biden needs to trash-bin. President Obama began the long overdue opening to Cuba during his final stretch in the White House. Now, with Cuba’s mighty little biotech industry poised to fight a global pandemic, there is even more reason to eliminate the U.S. sanctions that have long hobbled the bastion of Caribbean socialism. While Cuba’s biotech industry has managed to produce most of the vaccines necessary for its own population, the economic blockade has produced bread shortages on the island and has emptied its pharmacy shelves of even simple pain relievers.

Let Cuba help save the world, President Biden. Stop pandering to right-wing Miami Cubans who think you’re a Communist and will never vote for you. It’s time to let Cuba rejoin the global economy.

For more on Cuba’s Covid miracle, read this.