As a radiologist in Miami, working mainly with a lower income population, many of my female ultrasound patients are young women recently arrived from Cuba. It breaks my heart to meet these wonderful women with slightly tortured yet musical names starting with Y, such as Yunisleidys or Yosvaneisis. They have frightening termination histories. Some with over five or six abortions other with as many as 11 or 12.
This, to me, is not just a number, or the evidence of abundant “choice” and women’s liberation in Cuba. It is a sign of material, social, and spiritual poverty. Poverties that are willfully imposed on these women from above, by an oppressive patriarchy. The New York Times, interestingly, doesn’t see the connection.
