One of America’s top diplomats was in Jamaica last week. What did he and the government talk about?
In case you missed it, the US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, recently toured the Caribbean and made a stop in Jamaica.
He discussed two of the biggest concerns Jamaica has with the US right now - the Cuban Medical Programme and the US’s travel advisories on Jamaica.
So, the US has threatened to revoke the visas for government officials from any country that supports the Cuban Medical Programme.
The US believes that Cuba forces doctors and nurses to work under unfair conditions and makes money from their labour.
Rubio, who is Cuban-American, even called it "human trafficking." And if you don’t know, Jamaica and a lot of other Caribbean countries have a strong contingent of Cuban doctors and nurses. Jamaica has about 400 medical staff from Cuba.
Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley had previously come out and said she’s willing to give up her visa if the US pushes the issues.
During the visit last week, Prime Minister Holness made it clear that Cuban doctors and nurses are very important to Jamaica’s healthcare system. He said that all the medical staff are treated and compensated based on our labour laws, and Jamaica is confident that the staff are not being exploited.
The second issue was travel warnings. The US issued a travel advisory last year, warning Americans about travelling to Jamaica because of crime.
The PM said that the warnings hurt Jamaica’s tourism industry, which is a huge part of the country’s economy.
Holness argued that crimes against tourists are very rare, happening to less than 0.01% of the three million visitors who come each year. He also said Jamaica has worked hard to reduce crime.
Now, Rubio didn’t say they would remove the advisories, but promised to take another look and see if they could be updated to show the improvements Jamaica has made.
And that’s the bottom line.