Brazil now looking for Portuguese, Spanish doctors, not Cubans

Brazil now looking for Portuguese, Spanish doctors, not Cubans
BRASILIA | Mon Jul 8, 2013 5:48pm EDT

(Reuters) - The Brazilian government, under pressure to improve public
health services, has dropped plans to import a contingent of Cuban
doctors and is instead looking to hire physicians in Spain and Portugal,
the Health Ministry said on Monday.

The plan to bring in Cuban doctors created a backlash because of
questions about their qualifications. Brazilian medical associations
argued that standards at Cuba's medical schools were lower than in
Brazil and equivalent in some cases to a nursing education.

Brazil was rocked last month by massive protests fueled by frustration
with a high cost of living and deplorable public transportation,
education and health services, plus anger over the billions that will be
spent to host the 2014 World Cup.

In response, President Dilma Rousseff is moving to expand public
services, crack down on corruption and hold a non-binding national vote
on political reform. Her push to improve services comes even as the
government tightens the reins on overall spending in an effort to
preserve fiscal responsibility.

On Monday, Rousseff unveiled a health plan that aims to fill the lack of
physicians in rural communities and poor outskirts of Brazilian cities
by hiring more local and foreign doctors.

"Every Brazilian must have access to a doctor," Rousseff said in a
speech. "Brazil is short of doctors. If we don't have enough in Brazil,
we will look for good doctors wherever they are."

In May, Brazil's government said it was in talks with Cuba to hire 6,000
Cuban doctors to serve in remote parts of the country where medical
services are deficient or non-existent.

In the past decade, Cuba's communist government has sent 30,000 doctors
to work in poor neighborhoods of Venezuela, Havana's closest political
ally. Under an agreement reached back then with the late Venezuelan
leader Hugo Chavez, Cuba sent doctors in exchange for cheap oil.

Instead of a contingent of Cuban doctors, Brazil's Health Ministry will
hire foreign doctors where needed on an individual basis. Each foreign
doctor, a ministry official said, will individually apply to work in Brazil.

"We never reached a deal with Cuba. Now the priority is Spain and
Portugal," the official said.

Cuban doctors can apply, he said, but ads offering doctors work in
Brazil will be posted in Spain and Portugal, not in Cuba. The doctors
will be paid 10,000 reais ($4,400) a month.

Last week, Brazilian doctors staged demonstrations in several cities
opposing the hiring of foreign physicians. The government maintained
that it will do so to fill gaps left by Brazilian doctors who prefer not
to work in remote areas.

Rousseff said Brazilians will be offered the jobs first. "The goal is
not to bring doctors from abroad but to provide more healthcare in the
interior of Brazil," she said.

(Reporting by Anthony Boadle; Editing by Paulo Prada and Philip Barbara)

Source: "Brazil now looking for Portuguese, Spanish doctors, not Cubans
| Reuters" -
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/07/08/us-brazil-doctors-cuba-idUSBRE96713T20130708