Cuba says 25 health workers are sick, orders stricter quarantines to contain coronavirus

Cuban authorities warned Wednesday that they need to identified several cases of local transmission of the coronavirus and announced that 25 doctors, including 14 doctors and eight nurses, also contracted the disease.

Public Health Minister José Ángel Portal said at a news conference that in each of the doctors was in critical condition. Two technicians and an ambulance driver also are within the group.

Portal said a number of the infected staff had contracted the virus from patients who failed to initially show symptoms of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.

The minister said that an "important transmission event" occurred within the Calixto García Hospital in Havana, one in all the most important within the capital.

"We are in a condition to shut it" and transfer the patients to other centres, he said.

The official also reported "a smaller event" of transmission within the Manuel Fajardo Hospital, even in Havana, a hot spot for the virus.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, the Cuban government has been sending medical personnel to numerous countries in Europe, Latin America and also the Caribbean. It recently sent 101 nurses to Barbados.

But with the rise in cases, Portal announced that the health authorities were "qualifying" personnel to figure in medical aid units within the country.

"Working with critically ill patients in medical aid may be a very exhausting task," he said. "We are preparing staff to support our units."

On Tuesday, the Council of Ministers decreed that the country had entered the stage of "limited local transmission" which the Defense Councils, a military body operating throughout the country during emergencies, will impose quarantines to limit movement in neighbourhoods or municipalities where there's the local transmission.

The government had asked the population to remain reception and move out only to figure or to conduct essential activities. But images and videos from the island, where food is scarce, show many lines in front of stores. Authorities have complained that several don't abide by the new regulations or keep a secure distance publically.

The government had already implemented quarantines in two communities within the province of Pinar Del Rio, and also the neighbourhood referred to as El Carmelo in Havana.

As of Tuesday, 457 people had tested positive for COVID-19, and 12 had died, mostly over the age of 60. Ten other patients were in critical condition.