© Reuters. Jorge Enrique is helped by caregiver Silvia Garcia to stroll again house after exercising at a close-by park in Havana, Cuba, March 8, 2024. REUTERS/Alexandre Meneghini
By Anett Rios and Nelson Acosta
HAVANA (Reuters) – Cuban Clotilde Ravelo is inching up on 90 years previous, simply fractured her hip and, to make issues worse, most of her household have migrated off the island, abandoning a urgent challenge: Who will look after her?
Enter Cuba’s fast-growing non-public sector.
Ravelo’s grandchildren – two who dwell in the US, one in Spain and one other who has stayed in Cuba – have lately introduced on a non-public caregiver to attend her.
Aged care in Cuba has lengthy been the area of households – with exceptions for the susceptible – however as migration and financial disaster unravel the communist-run island’s long-held social security web, some are searching for alternate options within the rising non-public sector.
“I need help because I fell and I can’t walk alone,” Ravelo advised Reuters from her house within the upscale Havana district of Vedado as caregiver Dorayne Gonzalez ready her for an early morning session of stretching and calisthenics.
Ravelo is amongst 105 purchasers who now obtain care from the Havana-based Tatamania company, among the many first non-public companies in Cuba to attend the aged, the disabled and sick kids.
Her predicament isn’t unusual in Cuba.
Almost one in 4 on the Caribbean island nation are over 60 years previous, in accordance with statistics company ONEI in 2022. And record-breaking migration lately – stoked by widespread shortages of meals, gasoline and drugs – means many have been left with out assist at house.
Tatamania President Yadira Alvarez stated her firm started to fill this void in 2022, the primary non-public caregiver permitted after a reform the earlier yr approved non-public firms, forbidden since early in Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution.
The corporate now offers care in 4 provinces, together with the capital Havana, 24 hours a day and 7 days per week in each hospitals and personal houses, she stated.
Tatamania costs purchasers between 150 pesos to 220 pesos (47 cents to 69 cents) per hour, relying on the extent of care, a fee few in Cuba, the place the common month-to-month state wage is lower than 5000 pesos on the present black market change fee, can afford.
“Most of our clients are people who live abroad and who can pay for services provided to those they’ve left behind and vulnerable,” Alvarez stated.
There isn’t a publicly out there information on what number of seniors dwell alone in Cuba. However the authorities does present convalescent houses for some, and healthcare, although struggling shortages amid the disaster, is free in Cuba.
Niuva Avila, a College of Havana sociologist who research the plight of the aged in Cuba, advised Reuters care offered by firms like Tatamania, the place she additionally serves as vice chairman, needs to be seen as a part of a mixture of choices out there to Cuba’s fast-aging inhabitants – and never a silver bullet.
“Cuban society is demanding care services for older adults (and) the State is insufficient to meet this demand,” she stated.
However for the fortunate few like Ravelo, non-public assist from her caregiver, Dorayne, has proved a blessing.
“She spoils me and puts up with all my bad habits,” she stated.