CubaPLUS Magazine

It is October 24 and today two universal causes converge: the International Day against Climate Change and the World Day Against Polio, a deadly and disabling disease that was eradicated many years ago from our nation.

They are endeavors in which Cubans get involved and unite, in the first instance by the political will of their authorities and with the massive and organized participation of society: civil society and its massive and sectoral organizations.

The enormous global challenge represented by climate change generated by global warming due to anthropic causes, which has been advancing on the planet for several years, is taken very seriously in this country, due to the vulnerability that its insular condition gives it, among other reasons, by the dangers posed by the disturbing rise in sea levels.

Also, due to the increasingly frequent development of violent meteorological processes such as hurricanes and climate-related events -droughts or floods due to abundant  rains- and the effects of cycles known as El Niño and La Niña, in which experts point out that global warming acts as an accelerator, although they have been old processes for man.

Internally, programs such as the Life Task have been approved and are being carried out, which strives to protect the life of the mangroves,  life cycles of the coastlines and the marine reefs that protect coasts and prevent the salinization of surrounding soils. Cuba is a punctual and committed participant in the Annual Summits (COP) that have made efforts, many times, in vain, to reach agreements related to the subject, in which representatives of the developed world should take a more active role, since they have historically been the largest emitters of polluting gases that have exacerbated the greenhouse effect.

So it is a priority issue today on the national agenda, which cuts across common life and even the conception of each economic and social development plan currently underway. As for the fight against the disabling and deadly poliomyelitis, it is the pride of the compatriots that thanks to the first Mass Vaccination Campaign, started precisely in 1962, 60 years ago, Cuba became a territory free of this scourge.

Every year, the immunization is renewed punctually to the new generations of Cubans, from their earliest childhood, along with the supply of other vaccines that protect them against 13 diseases, many of these produced in the nation, thanks to the work of its scientists.