Swine flu apparently can be a nasty bug, but you can make a good case that the reaction to the recent outbreaks in some instances has been overblown. That is no different in Cuba, where the dictatorship hangs a lot of its reputation on the quality of "Cuban health care."
So at best, the Cuban secret police was a wee bit hypersensitve last week when officers arrested Cuban photojournalist Sandra Guerra Pérez after she reported on swine flu outbreaks around the world and advised her neighbors on how they could protect themselves.
Independent journalist Roberto de Jesús Guerra Pérez reported that police went to her Sandra's house in the farming village of Ojo de Agua in Havana province and took her away in handcuffs to a police station where they warned her to quit reporting about swine flu.
"The people in this town were uninformed and were alarmed to hear about the flu and began to clean sewers and around their homes and take a series of measures to prevent it," Sandra's daughter Lisandra said. "But my mother's commentaries on what has alarmed the world reached the ears of the political police, which is why they detained her."
Sandra Guerra apparently has the reputation as a troublemaker in Ojo de Agua. She also works as an independent librarian, keeping a collection of censored literature and supporting rural improvement projects in an area largely made up of farmers raising garlic, onions and rice.
The story did not say whether Sandra Guerra had been released from custody.
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