Cuba | US Relations, HIV transmission

Why in news?
US reopening embassies in Cuba.

Source: The Hindu

Significance:

• Vindication of Obama’s policy of engaging with nations with which Washington has hostile relations - patient and creative diplomacy
• Importance for US:
• U.S. embassy in Havana, nearly 54 years after President Dwight Eisenhower broke off diplomatic relations. Successive U.S. governments tried to overthrow and isolate the communist regime through various means, such as a proxy war, attempts to assassinate leaders, and sanctions aimed at its economy. But this approach failed miserably.
• In Latin America, it is the U.S. that stands isolated, while the rise of new progressive forces to power has strengthened Cuba’s standing in the region.
• Importance for Cuba:
• The Communist Party of Cuba knows the country can no longer count on others for economic support. 
• The Soviet Union, its Cold War-era benefactor, has become history. 
• Hugo Chávez, the Venezuelan President who started the sale of cheap oil to Cuba, is no more, and 
• the socialist regime in Caracas is battling its own challenges. 
• To recover from its economic troubles, Cuba has moved to ease state controls over the economy and allow private capital greater play. 
• Against this backdrop, better cooperation with the U.S. and the eventual removal of the blockade would prove boons for a changing Cuban economy. 

Challenges:

• military-political threats from the U.S. - and countering US hegemony
• maintaining the socialist character of Cuba

News about Healthcare in CUBA: 

• WHO has certified Cuba as the first country in the world to effectively eliminate mother-to-baby transmission of HIV, which causes AIDS, and syphilis.
• The WHO hailed this as “one of the greatest public health achievements possible”, in no small part because it was achieved by pursuing relatively straightforward strategies: 
• high rates of HIV testing, 
• better screening and treatment of expectant parents, 
• concentrating on high-risk groups, and 
• giving HIV- and syphilis-positive mothers options to protect their babies, like bottle-feeding and Caesarean deliveries.
• India: less than 30 per cent of HIV-positive pregnant women have access to prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV services
• India successfully pursued such a strategy to eradicate polio. 
• It can draw from its own experience, and from Cuba’s, for another big win for its healthcare system.

[Sources: Indian Express, The Hindu]