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

Resumen English
All with Cuba: Stand Against the Threat of Imperialist Aggression in April
15 April 2026
Condemnation of the U.S.
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
ESSAY: Is the US Anti-Caribbean? How to overcome it then, Tim Hector, 1997
08 April 2026
“...it is like a knee-jerk reaction in the U.S – this consistent, insistent and persistent anti-Caribbean policy in the U.S.
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
A Weak Left Stands By as Russia Stands Up for Cuban Sovereignty
01 April 2026
Russia finally makes good on promises to help Cuba, but its level of commitment is unclear.
Isaac Saney , James Count Early
Democracy Under Siege: Popular Participation and Socialist Renewal in Cuba in a Time of Crisis
01 April 2026
While Western democracies exclude working people from economic decision-making, Cuba is expanding participatory governance to navigate its deep
Josué Veloz Serrade
Cuba at the Crossroads of a Bogus Multilateralism
25 March 2026
“Cuba en la encrucijada de un multilateralismo hipócrita,” by Josué Veloz Serrade, appeared on
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
Cuba, Venezuela and Regime Change
18 March 2026
Regime change is possible but not inevitable.
Michael Manley
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
INTERVIEW: Cuba is Fundamental to Us, Michael Manley, 1977
18 March 2026
“If you can do that to Cuba because somebody doesn't like the Cuban revolution, then how do I know that you don't do that to me tomor
​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist , Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
What is the 'Left' in the Era of Global Fascism
18 March 2026
There is no coherent and sustained leftist movement at the very moment that U.S. led global fascism is accelerating.
Isaac Saney
Economic and Information War: The Manipulation of the March 13 Events in Cuba
18 March 2026
Washington is using economic warfare to manufacture unrest in Cuba, then using that unrest to justify more aggression.
Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
From Proclamation to Provocation: How Marco Rubio Signaled a New Era of Western Colonial Aggression
04 March 2026
Marco Rubio's Munich speech was a declaration of war wrapped in nostalgia for the old white "supremacist" world order.

More Stories


  • Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Rwanda’s 30-Year Assault on Congo: The Crimes, the Criminals, and the Cover-up
    01 Apr 2026
    Rwanda’s 30-year Assault on the Democratic Republic of Congo, a new 80-page title from Baraka Books, gets straight to the essentials.
  • Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    STOP Cruel Reich Cult (CRC) from reinventing the wheel
    01 Apr 2026
    "STOP Cruel Reich Cult (CRC) from reinventing the wheel" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
  • Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Zophia Edwards’ Book, “Fueling Development”
    01 Apr 2026
    In this series, we ask acclaimed authors to answer five questions about their book. This week’s featured author is Zophia Edwards. Edwards is Assistant Professor of Sociology at Johns Hopkins…
  • Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
    The Empire Has No Clothes: US Imperialism and the Hubris of White “Supremacy” Ideology
    01 Apr 2026
    Completely stripped of its democratic veneer, U.S. imperialism has been exposed as a system of monopoly capitalism driven by white supremacist psychopathology.
  • Isaac Saney , James Count Early
    Democracy Under Siege: Popular Participation and Socialist Renewal in Cuba in a Time of Crisis
    01 Apr 2026
    While Western democracies exclude working people from economic decision-making, Cuba is expanding participatory governance to navigate its deepest crisis since the Revolution.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us