Health care in Cuba? [Archive]

Solzhenitsyn

8th February 2010, 04:39

Filth, shortage and malpractice come standard:

http://www.therealcuba.com/Page10.htm

Lots of evidence that Cuba's health care system (at least for the average Cuban) is not so hot. Another shocking fact is that Cubans aren't allowed to say "no thanks" to whatever horribly invasive procedure the doctor wants to perform in said unsanitary conditions. Women do not have the "choice" of abortion - that decision is made by the doctors and enforced by the secret police.

Nolan

8th February 2010, 04:40

I wouldn't expect any less from you. :lol:

Solzhenitsyn

8th February 2010, 04:48

I wouldn't expect any less from you. :lol:

OMG! You can actually form a sentence that doesn't contain the word "fucking". :thumbup1:

Dooga Aetrus Blackrazor

8th February 2010, 06:35

I don't know a lot about Cuba, but they are a nation doing relatively well compared to countries in similar situations before Castro took over. I don't support Cuba's style of government or the idea that it's a legitimate socialist state, but I don't think it's health care system is nearly as bad as that website makes it out to be. Furthermore, the website clearly has strong biases. I'd be more interested in something from a group like Doctor's without Borders, Amnesty International, or someone else with some credibility.

And the United States has no room to brag. If we assume the States are significantly better than Cuba, so what? Then you're comparing a horse to a pony. Of course it's going to run faster. If you could magically make the Cuban system of government control America, there would be a significantly better health care system. I suspect even the health care systems of some dictators would work better.

The American health care system is shameful and pathetic. It's only cutting edge in research because it gouges patients and puts profits ahead of people. America could sustain the same development if it funded things properly. Or maybe told businesses selling medical supplies at unreasonable markups to stop doing so (or maybe the fact that they likely invest in said companies will discourage this). Oh, and if your doctors are leaving because the pay is too low, maybe you should get doctor's who actually care about people treating patients? Wouldn't that be nice.

Canada occasionally has people die because of our health care system. And you know what happens? Every time it happens, it makes the news. And there is always an outrage. Not as much as there should be, but there is one.

How many people die in the United States because of poor health care? A lot. The American health care system is terrible. So is Canada's system, but I don't want to depress myself by bringing in the European standard.

RGacky3

8th February 2010, 13:56

I'd rather trust the independant studies that show their healthcare system, dispite being in a very poor country, is way above standard.

Nolan

8th February 2010, 15:46

OMG! You can actually form a sentence that doesn't contain the word "fucking". :thumbup1:

It's hard to restrain myself from insulting ignoramuses like yourself.

ComradeMan

8th February 2010, 20:13

What is going on at RevLEFT at the moment? It seems there is a campaign "Out to get Cuba" and "We hate Che"...... LOL!!!

As far as I was informed that despite all odds Cuban healthcare was one of the things the Revolution got right, the Cubans send doctors all over the developing world and I believe one of the men involved in the summary "execution" of El Che was later on cured by Cuban doctors....

Le LibÃ©rer

9th February 2010, 02:13

I would be leary of biased articles like the one you have quoted.

Cuba has voluntarily sent doctors throughout Africa, Haiti, Bolivia, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, and other countries in the Caribbean, South and Central America willing to accept Cuba’s solidarity. Cuba even communicated that they would send doctors and medical assistance to the citizens of Louisiana and Mississippi following hurricane Katrina. Cuba has an International Medical School educating students from all over the world to be doctors that serve the poor, including students from the U.S.
http://www.a-aprp-gc.org/images/Cuban_doctors_put_on_stand-by_to_assist_Victims_of_Bush_Policies_after_Hurric ane_Katrina.jpeg

This is a pic of 3,000 doctors that were ready to be deployed by Cuba to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina, but was turned down by Bush's administration.

Not only that, Cuba is responsible for creating vaccines that have been given freeing to Africa and other under developed countries, unlike the profit driven products produced by big pharmacutical companies of the US.

Bright Banana Beard

9th February 2010, 03:07

I seen worse, check out the bathroom in other third world nations and tell me how much it costs do the poor people has to pay to get treatment.

Drace

9th February 2010, 03:32

I wonder how their life expectancy is 78. :)

So your whole argument consists of bunch of isolated cases and some quotes to present a general argument.

Here you go!
http://worldfocus.org/blog/2009/06/26/cuba-provides-free-health-care-without-the-worry/6016/

But if you want some statistical data, and research done by actual professional organizations...
http://www.cubatruth.info/ (http://www.cubatruth.info/doctors.html)

Nolan

9th February 2010, 03:43

Cuba has severe shortages of food and medicine from time to time. Also in some places there is a shortage of doctors, ironically. The thing that is really holding Cuba back though is lack of access to better medical equipment. Which is why there's little hope for you if you get a serious form of cancer in Cuba compared with the average person in the US. But considering its situation and the amount of corruption present, I would give Cuba's healthcare system a B. The US would get an F. In the wealthiest country in the world, 45000 adults should not die of lack of healthcare every year.

Anyone who takes that website at face value is an idiot.

Die Rote Fahne

9th February 2010, 04:41

Point about Cuba's health system.

Easy access, plenty of doctors and no profit motive.

Klashnekov

9th February 2010, 21:32

I personally visited a hospital in Cuba and it was NOTHING like this. Infact it are the complete opposite. It is disgusting that one should be allowed to post such pictures backed up by absolutly no evidence whatsoever. They are highly misleading.

According to the World Health Organisation(2000). Cuba has the 2nd best Healthcare System in Latin America and falls only 2 spaces behind North America. - Thats not bad for an isolated so-called "Third World" country thats blockaded by the most powerful country in the world, sitting only 90 miles away. - Oh also, isent that pretty embarrasing for the richest country in the world? - Not to mention Cuba's healthcare is FREE for EVERYONE.

CubaTruth.Info - The Truth about Cuba backed by UN Statistics.

LeninBalls

9th February 2010, 22:34

I won't be trusting a site anytime soon which says this (http://www.therealcuba.com/CUBAGULAG7.jpg) is racism with the text in the previous page beside it "more discriminated than ever".

Not to mention the damn image file itself is named "CUBAGULAG"

Red Commissar

9th February 2010, 23:25

Yea, I can't see a site like that being hardly reliable and unbiased. If anything it's made by angry Cuban-Americans and their conservative backers. It's really no more reliable than a site that has nothing but positive comments on Cuba.

Havet

9th February 2010, 23:38

Not to mention Cuba's healthcare is FREE for EVERYONE.

Nothing is free

Drace

9th February 2010, 23:40

I won't be trusting a site anytime soon which says this (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.therealcuba.com/CUBAGULAG7.jpg) is racism with the text in the previous page beside it "more discriminated than ever".

Not to mention the damn image file itself is named "CUBAGULAG" How is that picture racist? Its just a bunch of Cubans...
And racism I suppose might be a social problem in Cuba, but that that makes it no different form the rest of the world. How is equating racism with a gulag anyway?

And ironically, racism was against the law in the Soviet Union.

Nothing is free True, but it this still allows everyone to receive adequate health care versus health care only for those who can afford it.

Yea, I can't see a site like that being hardly reliable and unbiased. If anything it's made by angry Cuban-Americans and their conservative backers. It's really no more reliable than a site that has nothing but positive comments on Cuba.

Well, we cant completely throw out the arguments just because they are from a biased source. Bias certainly lowers the reliability, but it arguments are arguments.
The cubatruth.info site is extremely biased in this way but it has its facts and figures.

Havet

9th February 2010, 23:56

True, but it this still allows everyone to receive adequate health care versus health care only for those who can afford it.

The true question lies within: Why is healthcare so expensive so that only those who can afford it get it?

Jazzratt

10th February 2010, 00:08

Nothing is free

Therefore all healthcare should be provided by the kind of scum that would charge for it...

It's helpful that your kind don't even ptended to have any kind of moral or ethical framework. Money really is the alpha and omega.

IcarusAngel

10th February 2010, 00:08

Many things in life are free: Atoms, air, and our resources are all free. Our ideas our free, and without our rationality we wouldn't survive.

Health care in cuba is free in the sense that there is open access as well.

IcarusAngel

10th February 2010, 00:11

Therefore all healthcare should be provided by the kind of scum that would charge for it...

It's helpful that your kind don't even ptended to have any kind of moral or ethical framework. Money really is the alpha and omega.

Yaahhh Jazzrat is back.

Yes it's like in my signature. Olaf thinks that paying taxes requires more force than monopolizing land and forcing people to starve to death. (The difference is if you don't pay taxes, the state doesn't kill you.) At least social capitalists admit that capitalists have to be reigned in quite a bit.

Our "capitalists" here aren't just wrong, they're sick as well - they would rather destroy society so they can have their way than put the public in charge of the resources that they rightfully own.

Drace

10th February 2010, 00:12

The true question lies within: Why is healthcare so expensive so that only those who can afford it get it?

Because profit.

Solzhenitsyn

10th February 2010, 02:07

I personally visited a hospital in Cuba and it was NOTHING like this. Infact it are the complete opposite. It is disgusting that one should be allowed to post such pictures backed up by absolutly no evidence whatsoever. They are highly misleading.

I assume you visited the other healthcare system set up for tourists and Communist party elites. So the photos aren't evidence? What evidence are you willing to accept?

According to the World Health Organisation(2000). Cuba has the 2nd best Healthcare System in Latin America and falls only 2 spaces behind North America. - Thats not bad for an isolated so-called "Third World" country thats blockaded by the most powerful country in the world, sitting only 90 miles away. - Oh also, isent that pretty embarrasing for the richest country in the world? - Not to mention Cuba's healthcare is FREE for EVERYONE.

The WHO has no independent data. It simply repeats the statistics provided by Cuba (or any other nation) be they accurate and reliable or more akin to the Soviet Union's homelessness and crime statistics.

CubaTruth.Info - The Truth about Cuba backed by UN Statistics.

Yes real unbiased info there. The internet arm of the Cuban Communist Party apparatus.

Nolan

10th February 2010, 02:17

I assume you visited the other healthcare system set up for tourists and Communist party elites. So the photos aren't evidence? What evidence are you willing to accept?

The healthcare system in Cuba varies from place to place. Btw, did you see that pic of bigfoot? Neat stuff.

The WHO has no independent data. It simply repeats the statistics provided by Cuba (or any other nation) be they accurate and reliable or more akin to the Soviet Union's homelessness and crime statistics.

Yeah ok. Just ask any Russian that lived in the USSR about crime. Now they have to actually lock their doors lest they be robbed by the homeless and other byproducts of capitalism.

Yes real unbiased info there. The internet arm of the Cuban Communist Party apparatus.

And this makes yours better how exactly? As was said earlier, saying only positive is no better than ranting about how much Castro enjoys devouring small children. If you think the propaganda organ of the miami mafia is any better, woe be unto you.

Drace

10th February 2010, 02:44

Yes real unbiased info there. The internet arm of the Cuban Communist Party apparatus. The UN isn't led by Cuba.

Your argument goes something like this.

"OMFG NO CUBA IS EVIL AND THUS IT WOULD LIE ABOUT ITS STATISTICZZZ. EVERYONE IN CUBA IS ACTUALLY DYING!!! LOOK I GOT PICS OF THIS GUY DYING IN CUBA TO PROVE IT"

Nolan

10th February 2010, 02:47

The UN isn't led by Cuba.

Dammit Drace, I went to thank you and remembered youre restricted.

Drace

10th February 2010, 02:51

Video of people dying on the streets in Cuba.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxXxiNAdC-8
What a lucky guy that old man is in the video! Cuban life expectancy is only like 15, since their health care fails.

Look, there only smiling because there is a gun being held to their head.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yvzucp1tN0&feature=related

What Im saying is real because Cuba is evil enough to do this.

Shit, lol...You know, the way you talk about Cuba, you'd feel surprised that people are living there.

Dammit Drace, I went to thank you and remembered youre restricted. Im sorry :(

Solzhenitsyn

10th February 2010, 04:06

The healthcare system in Cuba varies from place to place. Btw, did you see that pic of bigfoot? Neat stuff.

It sure does CC. It varies from tourist and apparatchik dominated areas to where real Cubans get healthcare.

Yeah ok. Just ask any Russian that lived in the USSR about crime. Now they have to actually lock their doors lest they be robbed by the homeless and other byproducts of capitalism.

My in-laws are Russian and yes crime was rampant in the USSR but talk about it in news organs was suppressed. Every hear of Andrei Chikatilo? He kept killing for so long because discussion of crime was suppressed. The public wasn't warned that a serial killer was on the loose because it would make the Soviet Union look bad. At least in Putin's Russia people are free to talk about it.

And this makes yours better how exactly? As was said earlier, saying only positive is no better than ranting about how much Castro enjoys devouring small children. If you think the propaganda organ of the miami mafia is any better, woe be unto you.

You still haven't really addressed the content of the photos. Photographs know no political party. Do they depict what they describe? Are you suggesting they are somehow staged?

Skooma Addict

10th February 2010, 04:21

Yaahhh Jazzrat is back.

Yes it's like in my signature. Olaf thinks that paying taxes requires more force than monopolizing land and forcing people to starve to death. (The difference is if you don't pay taxes, the state doesn't kill you.) At least social capitalists admit that capitalists have to be reigned in quite a bit.

Our "capitalists" here aren't just wrong, they're sick as well - they would rather destroy society so they can have their way than put the public in charge of the resources that they rightfully own.
No arguments, only talking points. Just like your taken out of context sig is a talking point.

Nolan

10th February 2010, 04:35

It sure does CC. It varies from tourist and apparatchik dominated areas to where real Cubans get healthcare.

Haha CC. Me like.

Nice attempt at being a smartass. The healthcare in the cities is decent. It's the countryside that often has issues and shortages and whatnot, like every similar country in the world. Cuba is a third world Caribbean island. They provide the best quality healthcare to tourists to make money to keep the economy floating. This shouldn't be surprising. We don't know where and when these pictures where taken. They are not academic-quality proof of anything. As long as the CIA estimates the life expectancy at slightly less than the US and UNICEF (which works inside Cuba) reports consistently, its logical to assume there's something we're not being told.

My in-laws are Russian and yes crime was rampant in the USSR but talk about it in news organs was suppressed. Every hear of Andrei Chikatilo? He kept killing for so long because discussion of crime was suppressed. The public wasn't warned that a serial killer was on the loose because it would make the Soviet Union look bad. At least in Putin's Russia people are free to talk about it.

From almost every single account I've heard, one of the big pros of the USSR was the relative security and lack of crime. But hopefully Kayser Soso drops by and you can talk about it with him, I'm sure he'll sort this out, living in Moscow and all.

You still haven't really addressed the content of the photos. Photographs know no political party. Do they depict what they describe? Are you suggesting they are somehow staged?

Read above. I could take a picture of Obama's penis, smuggle it out, post it here and claim it's mine. You wouldn't know.

Solzhenitsyn

10th February 2010, 06:06

More depressing facts for Castro apologists, from a leftist no less:

http://econ161.berkeley.edu/movable_type/2003_archives/001473.html

The hideously depressing thing is that Cuba under Battista--Cuba in 1957--was a developed country. Cuba in 1957 had lower infant mortality than France, Belgium, West Germany, Israel, Japan, Austria, Italy, Spain, and Portugal. Cuba in 1957 had doctors and nurses: as many doctors and nurses per capita as the Netherlands, and more than Britain or Finland. Cuba in 1957 had as many vehicles per capita as Uruguay, Italy, or Portugal. Cuba in 1957 had 45 TVs per 1000 people--fifth highest in the world. Cuba today has fewer telephones per capita than it had TVs in 1957.
You take a look at the standard Human Development Indicator variables--GDP per capita, infant mortality, education--and you try to throw together an HDI for Cuba in the late 1950s, and you come out in the range of Japan, Ireland, Italy, Spain, Israel. Today? Today the UN puts Cuba's HDI in the range of Lithuania, Trinidad, and Mexico. (And Carmelo Mesa-Lago thinks the UN's calculations are seriously flawed: that Cuba's right HDI peers today are places like China, Tunisia, Iran, and South Africa.)
Thus I don't understand lefties who talk about the achievements of the Cuban Revolution: "...to have better health care, housing, education, and general social relations than virtually all other comparably developed countries." Yes, Cuba today has a GDP per capita level roughly that of--is "comparably developed"--Bolivia or Honduras or Zimbabwe, but given where Cuba was in 1957 we ought to be talking about how it is as developed as Italy or Spain.

and yet more photos of "The World´s Greatest Healthcare System" ®:

http://www.gentiuno.com/articulo.asp?articulo=2167

Bright Banana Beard

10th February 2010, 06:26

I assume you visited the other healthcare system set up for tourists and Communist party elites. So the photos aren't evidence? What evidence are you willing to accept? My stepfather finds these photo to be bullshit, he tolds me that pharmacy can simple take care of you, otherwise you can go to the hospital and get necessary treatment. Yes, he is Cuban and wanted to go back to Cuba. I other have another Cuban friend who also wanted to go back to Cuba after collecting enough money.

These photo are intend to produce that dirtiness means you are not taking care well. In fact, I seen worse than the photo provided.

Bright Banana Beard

10th February 2010, 06:40

http://www.gentiuno.com/articulo.asp?articulo=2167

Lemme rip the "horror" of these pictures.

http://www.gentiuno.com/articulos/articulo2167/imagenes/cubaho1.jpg
Are you fucking serious? I have seen that in, surprise, USA!

http://www.gentiuno.com/articulos/articulo2167/imagenes/cubaho2.jpg
This is common across third world, I am not sure why this is shocking.

http://www.gentiuno.com/articulos/articulo2167/imagenes/cubaho3.jpg
Go to any Central America place that have public bathroom and let me know. I seen worse than this when I was in Honduras, even the hospitals have those shit.

http://www.gentiuno.com/articulos/articulo2167/imagenes/cubaho4.jpg
You have to use pila or buckets and throw the water yourself. Even there is no hot water in Central America except for high business corporate buidling, which they done it with electricity. I applaud these Cuban for attempting to bring the shower inside the building.

About the cockroaches, how you ever consider that they gonna clean it up soon? And those equipments, HOLY FUCK! why do the Cuban government buy them to this poor hospital!? Vent in the hospital!? I didn't even see that in Central America!

Seriously, you are full of fucking LOL. I mean, it is even sad that I have to reply back. I can't express my word how sad your world is. But yeah, cleanness/dirtiness really doesn't explain why Cuba is ranked among the best in third world for health care.

Klashnekov

10th February 2010, 11:23

Video of people dying on the streets in Cuba.

What a lucky guy that old man is in the video! Cuban life expectancy is only like 15, since their health care fails.

Life expectancy in Cuba is 78. - UN Statistics

You dont know what your talking about

Oh, if you would prefer the CIA World Factbook, It's 77.

Havet

10th February 2010, 11:27

Because profit.

There has been profit before, and prices were way more affordable. Something else changed. Privilege.

Guerrilla22

10th February 2010, 11:39

The anti-Castro groups in Miami are always good for a laugh. Post some random unsubatainted pictures (of something you can't tell eaxcatly what you're looking at) and quote unnamed sources adn you have irrefutible evidence that the health care in Cuba isn't that great afterall.

Nolan

10th February 2010, 15:12

More depressing facts for Castro apologists, from a leftist no less:

http://econ161.berkeley.edu/movable_type/2003_archives/001473.html

and yet more photos of "The World´s Greatest Healthcare System" ®:

http://www.gentiuno.com/articulo.asp?articulo=2167

Someone pull up the data on Cuba. I can't find it. What percentage of the population lived in straw huts again?

ComradeMan

10th February 2010, 20:50

This Cuba debate is beginning to seem just like a reactionary attack on Cuba.

Check these photos...

Cuba?

http://english.pravda.ru/img/idb/photo/ap08010709247.jpg

.....no Naples, Italy.

Cuba?

http://images.icnetwork.co.uk/upl/icliverpool/aug2006/4/1/FDBB0D77-D1DD-318F-444FDD2FA8CAF1A8.jpg

....no Liverpool, UK.

Cuba?

http://img153.exs.cx/img153/1789/south20bronx7ut.jpg

...no South Bronx, USA.

Using selective photos to prove points about an entire country is very misleading.

You can have a gun pointed at you and be robbed very easily in Italy, the UK or the US.

As for healthcare...

Guess where this hospital photo is from...

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2008/08/05/article-1041968-022DFB3600000578-495_468x445.jpg

Cuba....? No- the UK.

I also found this excerpt printed in the British newspaper The Guardian, 2006.

At least 10 Florida-based journalists were paid by the US government to write and broadcast anti-Cuba propaganda, according to the Miami Herald. Three writers have now been fired by the Miami Herald newspaper group for an alleged "conflict of interest." One, Pablo Alfonso, who writes a column for the Herald's Spanish title, El Nuevo Herald, was paid $175,000 (£98,000) for hosting shows on the US-funded channels TV Marti and Radio Marti. The Cuban government has long alleged that journalists writing on US-Cuban politics were in the pay of the US government.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2006/sep/09/journalistspaidforwritinga

Nolan

10th February 2010, 23:59

ComradeMan

11th February 2010, 13:20

Good point ComradeMan. Trying to prove something through a few pictures is one of the weakest arguments you could make. I live in Appalachia. If I wanted to make the US look bad, I'd just have to go to the countryside and take pictures of barefoot small children in dirty clothes and rusty 30-year-old tractor trailers on cement blocks with trash strewn about the front yard and an old barrel to burn stuff in. That's how some of the working class people live here. And if I were supported by a multi-million dollar exile lobby in the country I was in, lets just say the US wouldn't look too desirable.

Thanks. :thumbup1: Something I've always said and people won't have is that the Third World is on your doorstep- it's just the measure of "third worldness" that changes. I know people don't like to use the word anymore, at least in Europe, they would rather use the unspeak phrase "developing world"- which is a complete load of crap if you think about it and in my opinion quite racist in a reverse way- implies that the old "First World" is developed, i.e. has achieved "it"... Back to the point, the measure of poverty might change but I read somewhere that 20 million people in the US live below the established poverty line, that's a third of the population of Italy and more than the Netherlands and Belgium put together!!! It's just the measure and perhaps the visibility that change...

I also think that it is convenient to have so-called whipping boys, while everyone is looking at them no one is looking at YOU!!! Hence the US makes a big song and dance about Cuba, or used to go on about apartheid in South Africa etc etc etc. Not to defend apartheid by any means, but a convenient way for countries like Australia, Brazil and the US to divert attention away from their own dubious track records...

ComradeMan

11th February 2010, 14:16

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/4/20100211/tuk-health-inequality-causes-early-death-dba1618.html

Up to 2.5 million years of life are lost each year in England as people die prematurely, a new report claims.
Health inequality 'causes early death'

The gap between the lifestyles of the rich and poor is having a major impact on the chances of living a healthy life, research suggests......

Havet

11th February 2010, 14:31

ComradeMan

11th February 2010, 20:14

Funny that this is happening in the UK...

How do you mean?

I wonder if this gets printed in the US and/or in Cuba?

Bud Struggle

11th February 2010, 20:56

How do you mean?

I wonder if this gets printed in the US and/or in Cuba?

I think he means that this was written in a country (UK) with universal healthcare--where such things should be worked out.

Havet

11th February 2010, 21:39

I think he means that this was written in a country (UK) with universal healthcare--where such things should be worked out.

Yes,

Clearly there are troubles with both universal healthcare and corporate health insurance.

Perhaps a third way is needed? :D

RGacky3

12th February 2010, 09:43

which is not free market healthcare, it would be just about exactly the same as corporate healthcare.

Jazzratt

12th February 2010, 12:29

I think he means that this was written in a country (UK) with universal healthcare--where such things should be worked out.

Except its about inequality of access, thanks to the government allowing privateers to come in and plunder every public service (see trains, post) in Britain. Were it the case that people cared more about providing access instead of facile "choice" then the NHS wouldn't be losing money hand over fist to black hearted private healthcare companies like BUPA and they wouldn't be an acceptable target for government spending cuts.

Right wing news sources have a great time laying into the NHS and they often accompany these attacks with fibs and distortions of facts (MRSA, MMR-Autism, idiot campaigns to "bring back matron"). It's best to take these attacks with an embolism-inducing pile of salt.