Chris Hani Remembered Cuban Medical Colleges Opened up for free training USA Longest economic expansion

The Cuban government recently opened the Latin American School for Medical Sciences offering free training for thousands of poor students from around the region who will return to work in their nations' poverty-striken communities.

The school's rector, Juan Carrizo Estevez explained that the school was working above all to form doctors who have a profound concept of humanitarian medicine for the people.

"We don't want them to be doctors who, as happens with many, view medicine as a trade and patients as their customers," he said.

At the opening ceremony Cuban president Fidel Castro also told students that they would be the "apostles and creators of a more human world."

"We want the students to absorb the same doctrine as our doctors – total dedication to their future noble work, because the doctor is a shepherd, a priest, a missionary, a crusader for physical and mental health and well-being."

Just a few months after its official opening, the school now has 1,881 students from 19 Latin American and Caribbean countries and Equatorial Guinea in Africa.

Another 1,500 are currently arriving for the new academic year and the school will eventually have between 8,000 and 9,000 students for the six-year medical training.

Havana covers all food, transport and general living expenses and a modest monthly income.

The students themselves express nothing but admiration for these acts of selfless solidarity at a time when the United States long-running blockade of the socialist country is as vicious as ever.

"It's incredible. We can't believe how the Cubans, in the difficult economic situation they are in, can do all this. They give us everything free, every book.

"We are so grateful, "said a young Argentine student Patricia Legarreta, who hopes to work in remote zones of Patagonia after graduating in Cuba.

Student Celeo Armando Solis Palma from a farm family in a poor, rural area of Honduras, said that he had always wanted to study medicine but did not have the means before winning the Cuba scholarship.

"We feel proud to be part of what Cuba is doing. This is an example to the world, the most humanitarian school in the world.

"The only way to pay Cuba back is to return and serve the most needy people in our countries, the rural areas where people are condemned to die for money problems," he said.

On top of this Cuba sends thousands of doctors to work in undeveloping countries every year.

According to Health Minister Carlos Dotres, Cuba had more than 3,140 medical personnel on duty in 58 countries around the world at the end of last year.

Only last week Zambian Foreign Minister Keli Walubita said that "Cuba has shown that it is a true friend,", welcoming an announcement that Cuba was sending more doctors to join the more than 1,000 already stationed in his country.

He also said that his country would continue with the rest of the world to oppose the long-standing US blockade on Cuba, which today is only supported by Israel within the United Nations.

This growing support for Cuba has led the western media - along with some ultra-left groups in the west - to claim that Cuba's international medical assistance is a form of "imperialism" which forces poor countries to depend on help from Havana.

This warped and twisted logic only reveals further the west's contempt for Cuba and the threat that Havana's very existence represents to an economic system that relay's on greed and selfishness to justify itself.