Havana, Cuba.- The Cuban Institute of Friendship with the Peoples (ICAP) on Monday defended the integrity of the Cuban doctors who are working in Brazil and condemned the derogatory statements by President-elect Jair Bolsonaro about them.

We support the statement from the Cuban Ministry of Health on the decision not to continue participating in Brazil’s More Doctors Program in a humanitarian act and to protect the physical and moral integrity of our physicians, the text added.

The document also rejected the discriminatory expressions by Bolsonaro on the Cuban health professionals who fulfill mission in Brazil.

Cuba has never abandoned nor will abandon its friends. We disprove Bolsonaro’s slanderous campaign by saying that Cuba has left the Brazilian people to their fate in health matters and has withdrawn from the medical mission, the statement noted.

Brazil’s More Doctors Program was created in 2013 during the government of then Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, with the aim of guaranteeing the presence of national and foreign doctors in poor and remote areas of the country.

Days ago, the Cuban Ministry of Health announced the decision not to continue participating in the More Doctors Program after conditions and threats by Bolsonaro.

According to official statistics, in the past five years, 20,000 Cuban doctors attended to 113 million patients and about 700 municipalities had a doctor for the first time.