Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Cuba Has Trained 170 Doctors From the US For Free
Cuba News Agency
08 Aug 2017
🖨️ Print Article
Cuba educates medical students including those from the US for free
Cuba educates medical students from around the world, including those from the US for free.

by Cuba News Agency

Under Fidel Castro’s direction, Cuban became a “medical superpower,” setting new standards for global solidarity in the interests of human health. Cuba’s Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM) has been training students from the United States to be doctors since 1999, and “has graduated more than 28,500 doctors from 103 countries, free of charge.”

Cuba Has Trained 170 Doctors From the US For Free

by Cuba News Agency

This article previously appeared in Granma.

“In my country no one helps the other student, here teachers support the preparation.”

Cuba has graduated 170 doctors from the United States through the project of the Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM), which was initiated by Cuban leader Fidel Castro in November 1999.
In exclusive to Cuban News Agency, Zenia Díaz Catalá, director of the general secretariat of the ELAM project, said that since the first graduation in 2005, to date, ELAM have graduated more than 28,500 doctors from 103 countries, free of charge.
Dr. David Floyd, from the 2016-2017 promotion, thanked the Cuban leadership, the Cuban people, the teachers and workers of this noble project, an example of integration between peoples for a more humane world.
“For me it has been a wonderful experience, I am impressed on the link between study and work, unlike training in the United States and other nations,” stressed the young physician.
“In Cuba we are trained by touching the patient, that was the greatest thing, the solidarity; in my country no one helps the other student, here teachers support the preparation with excellent behavior,” said Floyd, an African-American, who studied in Cuba for seven years, including the pre-doctor studies.
The doctor finished his curricula at the Salvador Allende Faculty of the University of Medical Sciences of Havana, an institution that graduated 52 foreign doctors, 25 of them from the United States, Dr. Suiberto EchavarrĂ­a, dean of that institution, said.
David Floyd, the father of the recent graduate, conveyed his eternal gratitude and said he was very impressed, pleased and honored because his son is a doctor trained in Cuba under ethical and moral principles, with a humanist conception.
Diaz Catalá explained that currently the ELAM project has a enrollment of 4,969 students from 112 nations in the 21 faculties of the country's medical science universities, of which 83 are from the United States.

Cuba
socialism

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


Related Stories

Isaac Saney
No To Terrorism, Genocide And Imperialism: Commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the Bombing of Cubana 455
14 October 2026
The 1976 bombing of Cubana Flight 455 was part of a six-decade U.S.-orchestrated campaign of destabilization against Cuba, which has now escala
Cheryl LaBash
Is starvation Rubio’s only strategy? The new attack on Cuba’s private sector
07 October 2026
The Trump administration's new sanctions on Cuba, are part of a dual strategy to create unendurable hardship while simultaneously making Cuba f
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
LETTER: “We See Preparations for a Direct Military Intervention by the United States and Its Allies,” Fidel Castro, 1990
30 September 2026
“I believe that the Movement of Nonaligned Countries…can buttress the united will of the Arab nation and help it to prevail against i
Abel Prieto
Venezuela: It Is What You See
30 September 2026
A photograph of Delcy RodrĂ­guez smiling with Donald Trump after the U.S.
Jacqueline Luqman
The Perfect Victim Narrative Applied To Foreign Policy Only Keeps U.S. Imperialism Alive
23 September 2026
The demand to call out alleged crimes in Iran or Cuba while those countries face annihilation from the U.S.
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
In the same boat?
09 September 2026
BOOM goes tuna and swordfish stuffed brown burlap bags aboardboats blown to smithereens. Presto! Fishing is now narco-trafficking.
Imani Nile
Don't Bring None of Your Anti Anti-Imperialist Bullshit to Cuba
09 September 2026
Empire taught us what to believe about the Global South.
Logan McMillen
After Blocking Fuel, the US Turns to Cuba’s Food Supply
09 September 2026
The Trump administration has already cut off Cuba’s access to oil.
Luciano Vasapollo
Cuba Stands Firm, Venezuela Risks Losing its Sovereignty
09 September 2026
Cuba's leadership has chosen resistance over subordination as the blockade tightens, but Venezuela's sovereignty is being stripped away.
Black Alliance For Peace
Declaration of a Zone of Peace
26 August 2026
From the blockade of Cuba to the kidnapping of Venezuela's president, U.S.

More Stories


  • Alina Selyukh
    Skulls Once Subject to Racist Study in Germany are Laid to Rest in New Orleans
    04 Jun 2025
    Looted African skulls come home after a century in German labs, exposing colonialism's history of dehumanizing "race science."
  • The Cradle News Desk
    US Greenlights Syrian Plan to Integrate Foreign Extremists Into New Army
    04 Jun 2025
    After 2011, tens of thousands of foreign extremists flooded into Syria with the backing of western intelligence agencies to help topple the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad.
  • Palestine Chronicle Staff
    Another Massacre at Rafah Aid Center as Gaza Death Toll Mounts
    04 Jun 2025
    Gaza health officials report mass casualties as Israeli forces shell humanitarian aid distribution points.
  • John Perry , Roger D. Harris
    US Reinstates Funding to Propaganda Outlet: NED Weaponizes “Democracy” in Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba
    04 Jun 2025
    After a brief pause, Washington's regime-change efforts against Latin American countries via the National Endowment for Democracy has returned.
  • BAR Radio Logo
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Black Agenda Radio May 30, 2025
    30 May 2025
    In this week’s segment we talk about jails and prisons in New York City and State and the end of city control of the infamous Rikers Island jail. But first a Washington DC activist analyzes how the…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us