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In late January 2020, the Chinese National Health Commission selected a Cuban anti-viral drug, Interferon Alfa 2b, among the treatments it would use for Covid-19 patients. This drug has been produced in Cuba by the Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (CIGB) since 1986 and in China since 2003 by the Cuban-Chinese biotech joint venture ChangHeber. It has shown its efficacy and safety in the therapy of viral diseases including dengue, Hepatitis B and C, shingles and HIV-AIDS. Because it interferes with viral multiplication within cells, it has also been used in the treatment of different types of carcinomas. Dr Luis Herrera Martinez, who led the team which first made the Cuban anti-viral drug in the 1980s, explained, ‘its use prevents aggravation and complications in patients, reaching that stage that ultimately can result in death.’ By March 2020, as China prioritised the drug, authorities around the world were requesting the Cuban product. Helen Yaffe reports.
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Our Change.org petition demanding that the British government learn from Cuba's approach to the Covid-19 pandemic, and activate legislation to counter the US blockade of Cuba, can be found here. Share the petition to get as many signatures as possible!
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Thank you so much to everyone who liked, shared and donated to Sunday's 'Marathon for Cuba'. 46.7 kilometres completed (29 miles)! You can see the videos uploaded as part of the run on our facebook. Any final donations can be sent via Go Cardless here:
Whilst we are still collecting in the final donations, we have already made a £350 payment to Cubanos en UK's emergency ventilator appeal, and will send on any final cash collected. Their appeal has nearly reached it's goal so please keep sharing and helping them smash their £25,000 target.
Rock Around the Blockade will use the remaining half of donations to campaign against the US blockade and build solidarity with Cuba Socialista here in Britain. We are producing a new edition of our pamphlet 'The streets are ours!' which will cover the fundamentals of Cuba's 60 year revolution and why we need to defend it from the escalating threat of economic warfare and intervention.
Watch this space for meetings, protests, campaigns and events
Viva Cuba! Smash the blockade!
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I am running a marathon – in one mile laps – this Sunday 10 May from 10am. I will be streaming live updates:
Watch me here: Sam McGill and Rock Around the Blockade:
Please donate via the Go Cardless link here: (** see note below)
https://pay.gocardless.com/AL0002KJW8Z5SM
- Cubanos en UK – emergency covid-19 appeal for ventilators to Cuba
- Rock around the Blockade –our campaign in solidarity with Cuba
Why not get involved and get sponsored to run your own mile laps, posting your videos too!
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Rock around the Blockade is supporting this fundraising campaign to buy equipment for ventilators for Cuban patients with Covid-19. They are blocked from purchasing new machines by the illegal, punitive US blockade. Please donate what you can and share widely.
When times are hard, that is when we most need generosity, kindness and compassion. We appeal to that generosity, that makes us better people, as we turn to you in asking for help. We need to buy components to build ventilators to support COVID-19 patients with medical complications in Cuba.
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Rock Around The Blockade, campaign of the Revolutionary Communist Group, condemns the escalation of US aggression against Venezuela and Cuba in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic. The Trump administration's deployment of navy destroyers to patrol the Caribbean near Venezuela on 1 April is a declaration of war and the latest move in protracted efforts to overthrow the Bolivarian Revolution. The US military deployment is part of a wider manoeuvre planned for the whole region involving aircraft and ground units, adding to deployments to Guyana and a major new military pact with Brazil, Venezuela's hostile neighbours. These actions will amount to the largest US military deployment in the region in the last 30 years.
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Pickets of Esso garages took place across England and Scotland as the Revolutionary Communist Group and Rock Around the Blockade took action against the illegal US blockade on Cuba. With a racist coup unleashing bloodshed in Bolivia against the Movement Towards Socialism government and their indigenous supporters, the pickets were broadened to urgently protest against US, EU imperialist interests in Latin America. ExxonMobil (whose European trading name is Esso) is the first to bring lawsuits against Cuban state companies under the newly activated Helms Burton Title III legislation of the US blockade. Not only does ExxonMobil target Cuba, back the brutal coup in Bolivia and back destabilisation in Venezuela, it heavily contributes to climate change and environmental destruction which threatens the future of life on Earth.
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From 11 - 14 of October 2019, Rock Around the Blockade proudly hosted Cuban environmental historian Professor Reinaldo Funes Monzote, alongside the Cuban ambassador to Britain Teresita Vicente Sotolongo, and associated embassy representatives for a speaking tour. In cities across Britain Professor Monzote spoke about the amazing progress made in Cuba on the environment and how the revolutionary socialist process has enabled Cubans to repair the environmental damage done to their country by centuries of colonial rule and imperialist domination. Reinaldo told us about how Cuba’s land was historically used for sugar farming by colonialists. Slaves were used to produce huge amounts of sugar cheaply for consumption in the countries that dominated Cuba: Spain and the US. This continued until the Cuban revolution triumphed in 1959. Since then it has been the task of the revolutionary government to reforest areas of land that were deforested to make room for sugar production and to undo the economic underdevelopment that occurred as a result of Cuba’s history as a subjugated country.
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There are increasing outbreaks of measles globally: 112,163 confirmed cases in 2019 so far (900 in England and Wales in 2018). Almost 110,000 people died from measles in 2017 – mostly children under the age of five. Complications can result in disabilities such as blindness and hearing loss. Europe had over 83,500 cases in 2018 in Ukraine (16 deaths), Greece, Italy, France, Serbia, Russia and Georgia, as well as Israel. Astonishingly (or not), Germany, Italy, Romania, Russia, Serbia and Ukraine remain endemic for measles, the world’s most infectious illness, but one which is entirely preventable with a simple, effective, safe vaccine. Driving the outbreaks are disadvantaged and marginalised communities of unvaccinated and under-vaccinated people, such as Irish Travellers or Orthodox Jews. There are inequalities in vaccine uptake by ethnicity, deprivation and geography. Between 2010 and 2017: the US had 2,593,000 unvaccinated children, France had 600,000, and the UK 527,000; in sub-Saharan Africa over 17m infants are unvaccinated annually.