House Republican blasts U.S. attendance at Ebola meeting in Cuba

TheHill

Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-Fla.) on Thursday said the U.S. should not have sent representatives from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to an Ebola conference in Cuba.

The meeting was organized by ALBA (Aliazna Bolivariana para los Pueblos de Nuestra América), a socialist-affiliated group, in Havana.

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Two U.S. officials, including Nelson Arboleda, the CDC's director for Central America, were in attendance and expressed support for Cuba sending doctors to West Africa to help treat the Ebola outbreak. 

But Diaz-Balart said the Cuban medical forces were likely forced labor and that the U.S. shouldn't ally itself with a group like ALBA.

"It is a disgrace that the United States sent a representative to an ALBA meeting in Havana and praised the Cuban dictatorship for sending forced medical labor to Western Africa," Diaz-Balart said. "That the U.S. would send a representative to such a meeting is by itself ludicrous."

The Florida Republican, who represents a Miami-area district, said the Cuban doctors were not ideal international partners to combat Ebola.

"Cuban doctors are hastily trained, poorly equipped, and forced to work in dangerous conditions while most of their pay is siphoned to the Castro dictatorship. That a U.S. official would condone their overt exploitation is outrageous," Diaz-Balart said