MIA MOTTLEY NOT SCARED OF U.S. VISA BAN, STANDS WITH CUBA

One Caribbean island nation is not amused by US threats of visa restrictions against officials facilitating Cuba’s medical internationalism.

In this recent video clip, Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley said if a US visa ban is the price for enjoying Cuba’s medical solidarity, so be it. She urged the rest of CARICOM (regional bloc Caribbean Community) to join her by standing on principle.

Cuba has been a pillar in the region’s healthcare. It has dispatched doctors to Haiti since 1998, has at least 400 medics in Jamaica and, as Mottley attests, played a crucial role in Barbados’ COVID-19 efforts. 

Cuba has also benefited Africa, with Algeria boasting links as far back as when French colonial doctors exited during Algeria’s hard-fought independence struggle in 1961. A few years later, Cuba formalised its medical solidarity work, helping people as far away as Ghanaians and South Africans to enjoy increased rural healthcare. 

The small island nation that has survived under an increasingly restrictive US economic blockade since 1960 provides more medical assistance than the G7 member-states (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States) and the World Health Organization combined.

While many have related to Mottley as a beacon of progressive politics for advocating for climate-change mitigation and reparations for crimes against humanity during the European slave trade and indigenous genocide, some have raised concerns about her. For instance, in 2024, Mottley’s government dropped an agreement to pay $3.88 million to the heir of a slavemaster, British aristocrat Richard Drax, after critics worldwide denounced the plan.

Mottley also pledged to send Barbados’ troops to Haiti under a US-funded occupation led by Kenya that is still underway. Such a move misses or conveniently ignores the economic and sociopolitical factors—including the role of the US, France and Canada, among others—that led to Haiti’s crisis. 

Let us know what you think.

Video credit: @PMOBarbados on YouTube (@miaamormottley on X, @mamottley on IG)

Sources

News

https://cayman.loopnews.com/content/watch-barbados-pm-mia-mottley-stands-cuban-doctors-nurses-732155 

Cuba Haiti

https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.13169%2Fintejcubastud.15.2.0203 

Cuba Jamaica

https://amsterdamnews.com/news/2025/03/13/cuban-doctors-in-caricom-are-not-trafficked/ 

Cuba Barbados

https://www.foreign.gov.bb/barbados-cuba-sign-a-health-cooperation-agreement/

Cuba Algeria

https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.13169%2Fintejcubastud.15.2.0203 

Cuba Ghana/South Africa

https://www.plenglish.com/news/2023/05/20/ghana-grateful-for-cuban-doctors-40-year-professionalism/ 

Barbados to pay slaveowner heir

https://caribbeanempowerment.wordpress.com/2024/04/23/barbados-mia-mottley-to-pay-reparations-to-slave-master

Mottly

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/24/barbados-leader-halts-3m-payout-to-uk-mp-for-drax-hall-plantation

US destabilisation of Haiti

https://haitisolidarity.net/haitians-struggle-to-survive-under-us-destabilization-policies

US blockade of Cuba

https://www.cfr.org/timeline/us-cuba-relations

Barbados troops to Haiti

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-44023-haiti-flash-barbados-suspends-its-decision-to-send-troops-to-haiti.html

US congressmembers call medical internationalism 'slavery'

https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/foia/Cuban_Medical_Professional_Parole_Program-Representative_Schultz.pdf