Even there, where stethoscopes seem like artifacts from other worlds, a toothache is deadly, a sprained foot prevents you from walking again or an appendicitis is a "divine punishment"... Cuban health specialists arrive as if they were miraculous healers.

Like quixotes, they also go to the places where natural phenomena have taken their toll on the people or where Ebola and COVID-19 have made themselves felt uncontrollable.

Throughout the five continents, in more than 165 nations, the internationalists of the island have made their own the battles of thousands of men and women against death. Those who have accompanied them say that they set foot in other lands with no other weapons than a Cuban flag in their hands. They fight it as if in doing so they were the gallantry of an entire country.    
For them there are no windmills impossible to defeat. Whether in field hospitals, in the homes of the inhabitants of the communities, under a tree or in the middle of the jungle, they help any patient, regardless of race, sex, nationality or economic position.   

Since May 23, 1963, when 55 doctors from the largest  of the Antilles left for Algeria to offer their helping hand, Cuba has maintained its willingness to help any country in need.

Operation Miracle, the Barrio Adentro Mission, More Doctors, the Latin American School of Medicine where specialists from the region are trained, the Henry Reeve International Contingent of Doctors Specialized in Disasters and Serious Epidemics, and so many other projects, are proof of the humanism latent in an entire nation.   

There is never a lack of a hand on the shoulder to soothe anguish and uncertainty, nor of words of encouragement to comfort, nor of kind, familiar attention. Our health professionals, who help people in any part of the world, no matter how remote it may be, are ambassadors of Cuba's most humane values.   

With the certainty that solidarity is the best way to pay our debt to humanity, every May 23 is celebrated the Day of Cuban medical collaboration abroad.