THE United States has again found itself in the line of heavy criticism as a result of confidential diplomatic cables published by the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks and a British newspaper for what appeared to be an attempt four years ago by Washington to discredit the Cuban healthcare system, including the long-running Jamaica/ Cuba Eyecare Programme.

In the cables published on Friday, US diplomatic staff in Cuba are said to have scoured for “human interest stories and other news that shatters the myth of Cuban medical prowess, which has become a key feature of the regime’s foreign policy and its self-congratulatory propaganda”.

The cables were sent at a time in May 2006 when the eyecare programme, which was running for just over a year, was being heavily criticised locally and calls were being made for its suspension because of serious complications, including blindness claimed by some patients after surgery in Cuba.

Chief among the critics of the programme, which was in its infancy, was Jamaica’s chief opthamologist Dr Albert Lue. His criticism was picked up by the United States diplomats in Cuba and dispatched to Washington under the heading ‘Medical Malpractice’.

“Dateline 31 May: Jamaican Dr Albert Lue has publicly denounced Cuban medical incompetency in handling Jamaican patients who travelled to Cuba for eye surgery. Of 60 such patients he surveyed, 3 were left permanently blind and another 14 returned to Jamaica with permanent cornea damage,” read a US cable addressed from the US Interests Section in Havana, which was published by the UK Guardian newspaper on Friday.

The dispatch was among more that 250,000 cables obtained by WikiLeaks, which then distributed them among several of the world’s leading news organisations. They reveal a candid and critical view of world leaders and administrations and have caused a stir in diplomatic circles.

But on Friday, an irate Horace Dalley — the minister of health in the previous People’s National Party administration under whose watch the Jamaica/Cuba Eyecare Programme came into being in September 2005 — slammed the diplomats responsible for writing the cable, calling them zealots and biased, and saying that they had misled Washington.

“…The United States long recognises how good the Cuban healthcare programme is and they would look for everything to discredit Cuba. They have always discredited [the country] and that is why they still keep the embargo on Cuba. They look for everything to fight against Cuba,” Dalley fumed during an interview with the Sunday Observer.

“The diplomats are so anti-Communist and anti-Cuba that they would look for everything to discredit Cuba. Some of them live in Cuba and know that Cuba’s health and education systems are the best in this part of the world,” added Dalley.

The publication of the cables, which drew Dalley’s ire, comes a day after the Guardian published another set of the confidential material in which US security officials in Cuba communicated to Washington last year that Cuba was frustrated with Jamaica’s nonchalant approach in the fight against transnational drug trafficking.

But Yuri Gala, the Cuban ambassador to Jamaica, on Thursday dismissed the cables as “manipulation” and “evilness” and said that his country’s problem was with its old foe America, whose illicit drug demand and money laundering posed a bigger threat to the region’s security.

However, Jamaican Prime Minister Bruce Golding acknowledged in a release on Thursday that there had been concerns by Cuban officials, but said that the issue was rectified. He noted that co-operation between both countries had resulted in several drug arrests.

Public sentiment in the wake of the cables’ publication was that the United States wanted to further alienate Cuba by driving a wedge between the Spanish-speaking island and Jamaica.

Both Caribbean countries have shared long, fruitful relations, dating back several decades, which were only interrupted in the 1980s when the Jamaica Labour Party Government, led by Prime Minister Edward Seaga, severed diplomatic ties with Havana due to influence from Washington.

In a statement Friday night to Sunday Observer queries, the United States Embassy in Kingston said it could not speak to the authenticity of any documents provided to the press “regarding purported assessments of Cuban-Jamaican relations”, but noted that cables in general did not represent Washington’s policy.

“These cables are often preliminary, incomplete expressions of foreign policy from the perspective of individual authors, and they should not be seen as having standing on their own or as representing US policy or a US diplomatic mission,” said the statement from the US Embassy.

“The United States understands and respects the fact that Jamaica enjoys good and productive relations with Cuba and its other Caribbean neighbours, and we expect those relations to continue,” added the statement in which the United States’ own “long, positive history” with Jamaica was highlighted.

Regarding the Jamaica/Cuba Eyecare Programme, the statement added: “We cannot speak to the authenticity of documents that allegedly question the quality of ophthalmic or optometric care Jamaicans may have received in Cuba. We are, however, aware of reports from the Jamaican press dating from 2006, in which Dr Albert Lue raises the issue.”

The partnership in eye care began in 2005 out of a need for Jamaica to achieve its obligations under the Vision 2020 global initiative which sought to ensure ‘the right to sight’ by eliminating the main causes of avoidable blindness. As at May this year, just over 50,000 Jamaicans have been screened, while more than 5,000 patients have had eye surgery under the programme.

Lue’s criticism of the programme in 2006 came after he examined 200 patients as part of the aftercare phase of the surgery and realised that 49 of those returning from Cuba were in a worse state than before. His assessment was that the surgeries were being done by trainee doctors. He called for the suspension of the programme and asked the Health Ministry to probe the matter.

Dalley, however, refused to suspend the programme, phase one of which was slated to run for three years.

Still, as the cries of disgruntled patients got louder — some threatening lawsuits — Dalley led a delegation of Jamaican doctors to Cuba for an inspection of three facilities where Jamaicans were operated on.

Lue told the Sunday Observer in an interview yesterday: “Based on how bad those complications were, my conclusion was that the (surgeries) weren’t being done by experienced-enough surgeons. I think they were using Jamaican patients as a teaching group of people.”