Human Immunodeficiency Virus in Cuba: The Public Health Response of a Third World Country

Abstract

This article describes Cuba's effort to develop a comprehensive program for control of its human immunodeficiency virus (HTV) epidemic. The program consists of multiple interventions, including blood donor screening, a ban on imported blood and blood products, widespread semicompulsory screening of defined and general populations, research and clinical trials on treatment and diagnostic methods, and health eduction in the press, radio, television, workplace, and schools. The most controversial of the program's measures has been the treatment of HIV antibody-positive persons (both asymptomatic and clinically ill) through what Cubans term a “sanatorial regimen,” consisting of admission into an institutional setting where both preventive and curative treatment is offered, and where residents have limited contact with their families, neighborhoods, friends, and the rest of society. The Cuban HTV control program merits studying because of the comprehensiveness of the measures in a poor country; the special experience of screening large, mostly healthy populations; its potential contribution to understanding the natural history of the disease due to the early identification and follow-up of HIV antibody-positive individuals; and the cultural, political, and socioeconomic conditions that give rise to a different epidemiologic profile of the disease and to an apparent societal consensus on the controversial issue of institutional semiconfinement.