The Hermanos Ameijeiras Hospital, officially the ''Hospital Clínico Quirúrgico "Hermanos Ameijeiras"'', is located in Barrio San Lazaro and is the premier hospital in

Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

, its tower prominently visible from the

Malecón A jetty is a man-made structure that protrudes from land out into water. A jetty may serve as a breakwater, as a walkway, or both; or, in pairs, as a means of constricting a channel. The term derives from the French word ', "thrown", signify ...

between the historic center and the uptown

Vedado Vedado (, ) is a central business district and urban neighborhood in the city of Havana, Cuba. Bordered on the east by Calzada de Infanta and Centro Habana, Cuba, Central Havana, and on the west by the Alemendares River and Miramar, Havana, Mir ...

neighborhood. It was opened in 1982. Hermanos Ameijeiras

The hospital is located at San Lázaro and Belascoaín streets in

Centro Habana Centro Habana is one of the 15 municipalities or boroughs (''municipios'' in Spanish) in the city of Havana, Cuba. A chinatown - ''Barrio Chino'' - is also located here. It is a smaller municipality of Havana, and it has the highest population dens ...

. It has a footprint of , and of floor space. The monumental lobby measures by with a ceiling and murals by Romanian-Cuban artist Sandú Darié.Juan de las Cuevas Toraya, ''500 años de contrucciones en Cuba'', p. 345. Havana, 2001, Servicios Gráficos y Editoriales, S.L.
/ref>

History

Origin and name

The site of the hospital (originally the Bank) was occupied from 1852 until the 1950s by La Casa de Beneficencia y Maternidad de La Habana. At the time of the

Revolution In political science, a revolution (, 'a turn around') is a rapid, fundamental transformation of a society's class, state, ethnic or religious structures. According to sociologist Jack Goldstone, all revolutions contain "a common set of elements ...

in 1959, the building was only partially completed - it was to be the Banco Nacional de Cuba and some of its dependencies such as the Stock Exchange. The decision was eventually made to complete the construction and turn it into a hospital, which was finally opened in 1982, 23 years later. The hospital was named after the Ameijeiras Brothers, which the Cuban state considers to be heroes of the Revolution. Efigenio Ameijeiras was one of them.

Corruption incident

In 1999 the

Miami Herald The ''Miami Herald'' is an American daily newspaper owned by McClatchy, The McClatchy Company and headquartered in Miami-Dade County, Florida. Founded in 1903, it is the fifth-largest newspaper in Florida, serving Miami-Dade, Broward County, Fl ...

reported that a government crackdown on

corruption Corruption is a form of dishonesty or a criminal offense that is undertaken by a person or an organization that is entrusted in a position of authority to acquire illicit benefits or abuse power for one's gain. Corruption may involve activities ...

had extended to Hermanos Ameijeiras, uncovering that three top officials there had mishandled hard-currency income and as a result were fired or forced to resign.

2007 film

In the 2007 film ''

Sicko ''Sicko'' is a 2007 American political documentary film by filmmaker Michael Moore. Investigating health care in the United States, the film focuses on the country's health insurance and the pharmaceutical industry. Moore compares the for-prof ...

'' by

Michael Moore Michael Francis Moore is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and author. Moore's work frequently addresses various Social issue, social, political, and economic topics. He first became publicly known for his award-winning debut ...

, Moore took a group of Americans to Cuba to show that the quality of care that they would receive there, this to prove a point that a socialized medical system could provide the patients better care than they would receive in the U.S., where those patients would not have money or insurance to pay for good care in the private U.S. health care system. Moore insisted in the movie as well as in an interview with

John Stossel John Frank Stossel (born March 6, 1947) is an American libertarian television presenter, author, consumer journalist, political activist, and pundit. He is known for his career as a host on ABC News, Fox Business Network, and Reason TV. Stos ...

ABC News ABC News most commonly refers to: * ABC News (Australia), a national news service of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation * ABC News (United States), a news-gathering and broadcasting division of the American Broadcasting Company ABC News may a ...

that the treatment provided was just like that given to any Cuban; but Stossel's research led him to conclude that the hospital provided service only for the Cuban elite and that this care was not available to the average Cuban."Healthy in Cuba, sick in America?", ABC News, 2007-09-07
/ref> In 2010, dissident Orlando Zapata died at the hospital after a hunger strike.

References

External links

CASTRO INAUGURATES CENTRO HABANA HOSPITAL
{{Authority control Hospital buildings completed in 1982 Hospitals established in 1982 Hospitals in Cuba Buildings and structures in Havana 1982 establishments in Cuba 20th-century architecture in Cuba