Back in mid April when we went we, along with another woman off our flight, got hauled into secondary inspection by Aduana. We had a bag full of over the counter medications for kids and adults, the other woman had a bag full of medical supplies including pharmaceuticals and syringes etc. While my DH dealt with Aduana I stood outside with friends of the womans. I'm not sure that it was an NJT bag but her friends said that she had all kinds of official paperwork, along with an inventory of all the stuff that she had brought for a clinic. Aduana was giving her a really hard time. Our Rep., who held the bus for us, asked if we had brought any medicines to donate with us and I told him we had. He informed us that the Cuban government had recently changed the rules and they no longer wanted travellers bringing medical aid into the country which he thought was a pretty stupid thing for the government to do. Even after I explained that all the things we brought were non prescription items he said they would likely refuse to allow it into the country and we would have to inventory everything for pick up on the way home. (Which would cause a lengthy delay and he would be unable to hold the bus for that long
)
As it turns out they didn't even question our bag of medications but as we left they were still grilling the other poor woman. It was her and her friends first trip to Cuba, just trying to do something good and that's the treatment they got, which probably lost Cuba any future tourist revenue from them or any of their friends..I mean if you're going to change the rules you really need to let people know..especially someone like NJT!!
