Havana, Cuba - New data suggest US economic sanctions on Cuba have contributed significantly to the country's rising infant mortality rate.
A new report from the Center for Economic and Policy Research found that Cuba's infant mortality rate (IMR) has increased from an annual rate of 4 per 1,000 live births in 2018 to a rate of 9.9 as of 2025. This amounts to a 148% increase over the time period studied.
If the IMR had stayed at its 2018 rate, around 1,800 fewer babies would have died between 2019 and 2025.
Until recently, the researchers note, Cuba's IMR was among the lowest in the Western Hemisphere – and lower than that of the US.
The dramatic growth has corresponded with a tightening of the US embargo aimed at strangling the Caribbean island's economy.
Since 2017, the US has taken action to weaken Cuba's tourism industry, block certain exports to Cuba, re-add the country to the State Sponsor of Terrorism list, and restrict the flow of remittances, among other damaging measures.
In recent months, the Trump administration has escalated its aggressive policy with a brutal fuel blockade, which has led to rolling blackouts and shortages of medicines and other basic necessities.
"The unparalleled hardening of US sanctions against Cuba during the first Trump administration, the Biden administration’s decision to largely maintain these policies, and the further expansion of sanctions during the second Trump administration, including a devastating fuel blockade, is very likely the primary cause of the current economic and humanitarian crisis in Cuba, which is widely considered to be the worst in the island’s contemporary history," the report reads.
Trump policy toward Cuba has "killed a lot of babies"
Recent Trump administration actions are only expected to have made matters worse for Cuba's health care system.
"The Trump policy of 'maximum pressure' on Cuba has killed a lot of babies – and, although we don’t yet have data for the last few months, it’s highly likely that more babies are dying now, and at an even higher rate than last year as a result of the current US fuel blockade targeting Cuba," CEPR Director of International Policy and report coauthor Alexander Main said in a statement.
"The question is how many more babies will have to die before the current economic siege against Cuba is lifted."
The report notes that other key health indicators, such as life expectancy and maternal mortality, have also likely deteriorated since Trump launched the energy blockade in January.
Trump has also ramped up his threats of invasion, saying in March that he believed he would have "the honor of taking Cuba."
"The sanctions on Cuba starkly illustrate how these economic sanctions work: they target the civilian population, often with the goal of provoking regime change," said CEPR Co-Director Mark Weisbrot.