HEALTH CARE IN CUBA
The success of the Cuban health care system since the Revolution can be judged by numerous indicators: by the health of the population, by statistics, or by interest shown in the model by other countries.
The public health care system was organised on three levels: primary care, through polyclinics and rural hospitals, secondary care at municipal and provincial hospitals, and tertiary care at national hospitals and scientific institutions.
Free medical care was guaranteed to all, and the process of training medical and paramedical personnel began (in 1959 and 1960, 3,000 doctors - half of the doctors in Cuba - left the country). Scientific capacity had to be developed, equipment had to be bought, and construction was needed to provide facilities. The immediate result of these efforts was the eradication of transmissible diseases, and preventable diseases were gradually brought under control through a massive vaccination programme, improved sanitation, and the equitable distribution of wealth.
Today Cuba has more than 51,045 doctors and the highest standard of health care in Latin America. The Cuban experience is being looked at with much interest by many countries in the Americas: Brazil has begun implementing the model, and Cuba is co-operating with Venezuela with a view to implementing the model there. Cuba has complied with the World Health Organisation's criteria for "Health for All in the Year 2000", although it is now struggling to maintain the standards that have been developed so effectively since the Revolution.
CUBA: infant mortality rate LATIN AMERICA: infant mortality rate 1994
(per 1,000 live births) (per 1,000 live births)
1959 60 Bolivia 89 Paraguay 48
1969 46.7 Haiti 89 Venezuela 34
1979 19.4 Peru 68 Mexico 30
1989 11.1 Honduras 62 Panama 23
1990 10.7 Dominican Argentina 22
1991 10.7 Republic 59 Uruguay 21
1992 10.2 Ecuador 59 Colombia 18
1993 9.4 Nicaragua 58 Chile 17
1994 9.4 Brazil 55 Costa Rica 14 El Salvador 50 Cuba 9.9
Countries with infant mortality rates of less than 11
CUBA, Israel, Portugal, Greece 10
United States, South Korea 9
IRELAND, Singapore, Belgium, Australia
Italy, New Zealand, Germany, Denmark
Austria, Spain 8
Canada, Switzerland, France, England
Norway, Holland 7
Finland 6
Japan 5
Sweden 4
Sources: State of the World's Children (UNICEF).
National Statistics Directorate of MINSAP.
In Cuba today, the advances made in heath care are under immediate threat: virtually everything, from medicines to sutures, is in short supply or in many cases not available. Much of the technical equipment was imported from Europe, but now spare parts are almost impossible to get, because new US regulations forbid companies to sell any item to Cuba if any of the components are of US origin. To enforce these regulations, the United States will not trade with any company that trades with Cuba. The result is that vital equipment lies idle all over Cuba because the United States will not allow spare parts to be sent.
We are familiar with the situation that exist in most of the Third World, where health programmes are difficult to implement because little of the necessary infrastructure - clinics, hospitals, etc.- exists. The opposite is now the case in Cuba, where an excellent infrastructure exists, where there are more than enough doctors, nurses, specialists, and health technicians, but where the medicines and technical equipment are in short supply. More than 30 millions doses of a vaccine, developed and manufactured in Cuba, to combat meningitis have been administered in Cuba, Brazil and Columbia. Argentina and other Latin American countries are now using the vaccine. However, the continuing availability of this drug to Cubans and other nationalities is uncertain due to the blockade. Instead of coming to the aid of the Cubans, the United States, alone among the countries of the world, has adopted legislation specifically to prevent assistance reaching Cuba.
