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<\/p>\nOn a recent afternoon, a group of elderly residents slipped through the wooden doors of the Church of the Holy Spirit in Old Havana and gathered for a modest meal of ground meat, rice, red beans and crackers topped with mayonnaise \u2013 all finished with a cup of strong Cuban coffee.<\/p>\n
\u201cMay the Lord bless from his height, the meal our belly will take with delight,\u201d they chanted in unison before beginning their lunch, a ritual that takes place three times a week in the dining hall adjacent to the church.<\/p>\n
Among the elderly people was Carmen Casado, an 84-year-old retired chemical engineer who attends without fail. Her monthly pension of 2,000 Cuban pesos is equivalent to US$4 at the informal exchange rate. She says the church meals are a needed supplement to the meagre rations that she can obtain for free from state-run stores. \u201cThis is a lifeline for us retirees with small pensions,\u201d said Ms. Casado, speaking in a rapid-fire tone. \u201cWhat we get from the bodegas alone is not enough.\u201d<\/p>\n
Shoppers at state-run Cuban bodegas have used ration books, or libretas, since Fidel Castro established the system in the 1960s. Lately, the bodegas are giving out less and less as the economy collapses.<\/p>\n
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Carmen Casado accepts food at the Church of the Holy Spirit, which has free meals three times a week.<\/p>\n
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Before heading into the church dining hall, Carlos Lugo, 82, shows off a pair of jeans he got through charity. <\/p>\n
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Mercedes Lopez Rey carries one of the church-sponsored meals to a homebound friend. <\/p>\n
The elderly are among the hardest hit by the severe economic crisis on the island, which has worsened dramatically since the beginning of the year following an oil embargo imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n
Most are former government employees \u2013 teachers, doctors, nurses, technicians, custodians, lawyers \u2013 whose pensions are usually less than US$10 a month and who must face cuts to the basket of goods that have been subsidized for decades, as well as the loneliness brought on by the growing emigration of young people.<\/p>\n
They were young when Fidel Castro entered Havana and lived through all the major events on the island, from the Bay of Pigs invasion to U.S. President Barack Obama shaking the hand of Ra\u00fal Castro in 2016.<\/p>\n
Now, their revolutionary spirit is being tested in the latest crisis, which is forcing them to sell cigarettes on the streets, line up for a loaf of bread and seek free meals offered by churches and some state institutions.<\/p>\n
En route to her one-room apartment, Mercedes Lopez Rey passes piles of uncollected trash. People in Havana sometimes forage through these heaps in hopes of finding something useful.<\/p>\n
After lunch, Ms. Casado walked the four blocks home to tend to household chores she still performs without assistance. Her home is on the second and top floors of a 19th-century building that, like many in the capital, is falling apart.<\/p>\n
Born in 1942, Ms. Casado was a teenager when the revolution led by Castro triumphed. Her life has spanned the island\u2019s most defining moments, from the 1962 Missile Crisis to the so-called Special Period following the collapse of the Soviet Union. She also lived through the 1970s and 80s, when the island\u2019s economy was heavily subsidized by the Soviets and when the Cuban system seemed to promise a brighter future.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is our life; we were born and raised here,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Ms. Casado was born during the rule of Fulgencio Batista, the dictator that the Communists overthrew. Since then, she has seen decades of changing political postures between Cuba and the United States.<\/p>\n
The Associated Press<\/p>\n
Even before the economic crisis worsened and before the wave of emigration over the past five years, Cuba was already one of the countries with the oldest populations in Latin America. According to Cuba\u2019s National Bureau of Statistics, by the end of 2024, almost 26 per cent of the population was aged 60 or older. <\/p>\n
The past five years have seen a population decline in Cuba of nearly 1.5-million, primarily due to migration. The number of Cubans residing on the island, which stood at 11.1-million, has fallen to just 9.7-million. The impact of the crisis and the exodus of youth is visible at a glance. Elderly people walk the streets alone \u2013 some rummaging through trash, others standing in long lines for the bread and rice provided by the ration book, the basic subsidized foods the state guarantees to every Cuban.<\/p>\n