Las Tunas hospitals have also begun to order homemade hospital bracelets from Arturo Batista
HAVANA TIMES – With truck engine casings and tire valves, a Las Tunas ponchero (tire repairer) manufactures and repairs blood pressure monitors. Given the lack of resources and the impossibility of replacing equipment, the hospitals of the province have begun to order the material from Arturo Batista, and now they give him materials so that he can produce more.
Interviewed by the State newspaper Periódico 26, Batista remembers the first time someone asked him to replace the latex in a blood pressure monitor. “That was in 2004, and I did it based on my experience as a ponchero, and it worked and is still working after all this time.”
The story of the ponchero drew attention on social networks, and some users questioned whether the material intended for vehicle parts should be allowed in instruments for measuring blood pressure. “I am concerned about the rigidity of the bands used in this work. I am referring to the material and its thickness; let’s remember that it will be inflated by doctors with their hand, not with a bicycle pump,” warned a user on Facebook.
However, anticipating the reluctance of the patients, Alberto Charles Martínez, director of the Provincial Center of Electromedicine of Las Tunas, told Periódico 26 th
