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ABSTRACT

An editorial in a recent double issue of Seminars in Oncology dedicated to Cuba commented that, in contrast to most current therapeutic research that provides relatively little new information, Cuban research represents “ . . . truly out of the box thinking, crafted in a country where resource limitations have clearly incentivized novel approaches.” Indeed, this is a hallmark of Cuba’s scientifi c sector, forging ahead in a developing island nation under six decades of US embargo and battered by the vicissitudes of global, regional and national economic fl uctuations.
But “out of the box” may only be the entry point into a broader conceptualization that calls upon science to generate discoveries not for its sake alone, but in response to the critical needs of population and planetary health and wellbeing. Today, in addition to medicine and vaccine development and production, priorities for Cuban science include food security, sustainable energy, climate adaptation and society-wide incorporation of information technologies. Several of these notions are in fact incorporated into draft constitutional reforms approved by parliament this month and now subject to a national referendum.