By LARA PICKFORD-GORDON Saturday, August 15 2009

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CUBANS ARE HERE: Cheerful Cuban doctors applaud at yesterday's start of their Orientation Programme for Health Care Professionals, at the Cascadia Hot...

Health Minister Jerry Narace is hoping the first group of Cuban doctors and nurses will begin work at hospitals and health centres within 30 days.

He made the disclosure while speaking to the media following yesterday’s opening of a four-day orientation programme for 35 Cuban medical personnel (14 doctors and 21 nurses) at Cascadia Hotel, St Ann’s. The group arrived on Wednesday.

Narace said the personnel still had to be interviewed by the panel comprising the Chief Medical Officer, three doctors with more than ten years experience, and a lay person. He told the media that the panel members had not yet been finalised, but the exercise should be completed shortly. “The panel will have to examine all of them. They will have to be tested for proficiency in English Language. It could be when the panel is completed they are not satisfied, we may say we have to send back some if that is the case, and replace them as may be required.”

Language testing will be done by College of Science, Technology and Applied Arts of TT. Cuban Ambassador Sergio Oliva Guerra said accommodation has been provided for the medical personnel since it was not the first time Cubans were coming to work in TT, and they were like any other foreign medical workers. He said their salaries would depend on their qualifications. “There are scales of salaries,” he said.

Responding to a question about how many medical personnel from the programme had defected to another country Guerra said the groups comprised hundreds and “we have had around ten people who defected, and go to Miami, we don’t know. Some of them got married here in Trinidad. This is not a problem the majority of them are back in Cuba.”