President Hugo Chavez: "Health is not something to be bought and sold!"

[Judi Lynn]

Published: Thursday, September 22, 2005
Bylined to: Hugh O'Shaughnessy


President Hugo Chavez: "Health is not something to be bought and sold!"



Irish Times Hugh O'Shaughnessy writes: Under President Chavez the health service -- a shambles for decades -- is slowly beginning to improve.

Dr. Coromoto Landaeta is an opposition spokesman for the doctors and the health industry in Venezuela's National Assembly and he does not like what is going on here. "Under President Hugo Chavez, we are seeing the end of the democratic medicine as we know it in Venezuela," he declares with the utmost forcefulness.

Sadly for the good doctor and his many supporters, Venezuelans know that their country's health care has never been 'democratic' ... indeed it has been a total shambles for decades.

Many Venezuelan doctors traditionally look on medicine less as a caring profession and more as a well-paying career.
After graduation, most do their compulsory eight-month stint in public health in rural areas but then head back to the big towns where the money is.
(snip/...)

http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=46083



A Cuban doctor, working in Venezuela as part of the Barrio Adentro programme, at work in a barrio in Caracas

Strides in social sector

JOHN CHERIAN
VENEZUELA under Hugo Chavez has embarked on an ambitious scheme to empower its people. The goal of the "Bolivarian revolution" is to ensure that the majority of the people participate in the decision-making process, and that their basic health, education and literacy needs are met.

Venezuela, despite being the fifth largest oil exporting nation in the world, has remained an underdeveloped country. Eighty per cent of its people live in poverty and the illiteracy rate is high. Chavez said that neo-liberal economic policies produced a million illiterate people out of a population of 25 million. The minority white elite cornered most of the benefits and enjoyed a life-style comparable to the rich in the United States. A large portion of the oil wealth found its way into private bank accounts. Corruption is still rampant, despite the efforts of the government to stamp it out. As it is, the government bureaucracy is a remnant of the ancien regime and not yet in tune with the goals of the revolutionary government.

It is in the social arena that the government has taken a big leap forward. Three years ago, the government launched a literacy programme called the "Mission Robinson". Named after Samuel Robinson, a close associate and adviser of Simon Bolivar, the South American liberation hero, it has already completed an important part of its objective - spreading basic literacy to barrios (shanty towns) and remote regions of Venezuela.
(snip)

This writer saw Venezuelans waiting to get their X-rays done and their teeth fixed and queuing up for coronary check-ups. Medicine was dispensed free of charge. The residents of San Pedro said that it was for the first time that they were being treated with such professionalism and dignity. Cuban physical instructors teach young Venezuelans sports in primary schools. The old are taught physical exercises to keep themselves fit.
(snip/...)

http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2201/stories/20050114000705800.htm

[willing dwarf]

1. Long live the Bolivarian revolution!

The shameful history of exploitation-- the enslavement of her people and the raping of her lands-- may be redeemed in the work of leaders like Hugo Chavez.

And with oil, they can afford to increase the way of life for the poor. Meanwhile in the once mighty USA people are set against each other, squabbling over thinner and thinner wedges of the pie.

[NobleCynic]

2. Good luck with that, he'll need it

Corruption has been a way of life for near 500 years in that area of the world. Culturally, Chavez is in for the fight of his life if he's actually serious about doing something about it. Nepotism isn't looked down upon in the same way as it is here. In any case however, oil money going to education is definitely a marked improvement.

[rman]

4. in our area of the world corruption still is the way of life

[Ben Ceremos]

5. Corruption has been a way of life for near 500 years in that area of the w

I find it disconcerting that you would talk about "that area of the world", it sounds like a Bushism. Corruption is a factor in governance in all areas of the world. It seems that the trust we place in government is abused by a set of rules/climate/culture that generally allow the corrupt to avoid taking responsibility for their activities. By writing "that area of the world" you are tarring all of Latin America. That is a subtle form of racist thought. You may not have intended it as such, but it is racist.
You need not look very far from your home to see what corruption permeates American government at all levels. When a cop gets a free coffee, it's corruption. When a "buddy" gets away with a "minor traffic violation", that's corruption. When no-bid contracts are awarded to corporations once run by the 'vice'-president (still run by him in absentia), that is corruption. And when racist speech gets into the mind and conversation of "progressives', well, that's also corruption; albeit of a different sort. Please try to think it out before you state it.

[malaise]

6. Well said n/t

[Mika]

13. Corruption of the Cuban health care system is epidemic and spreading!

The damned world class Cuban socialized health care sector won't bow to US corporate managed health care insurance corporations.

Damn the Cubans and their highest dr/citizen ratios. Damn their local and free clinics in every neighborhood. Damn their preventative approach to health management. Damn their health oriented institutionalized education system. Damn their national organic farming systems.

Obviously Cuba and the Cuban health care system is corrupt - where's the profit in it for the petrochemicaldrug companies?

FREE CUBA NOW (and let US corporate health care corporations show them how things get done right)!

:sarcasm: :sarcasm:

[calimary]

9. Welcome to DU! Sometimes I look a this guy and wonder if we couldn't

maybe borrow him up here for a few years?

I mean, just recently he's not only stood up to bush but offered inexpensive gasoline to American consumers afflicted by the price gouging of "free market forces" - and now he makes this declaration about health care... I realize saying and doing are two different things and he, too, is up against some monstrous piracy and robber baron machinery. But Dearest God, that's the mentality WE need in OUR leadership.

[Nay]

3. How refreshing! Someone who thinks that people aren't just

disposable pieces of trash!

[calimary]

10. Would those be the people who are "underprivileged anyway"?

:grr:

[buzzsaw_23]

7. Amen

Healthful food is a right not a privilege!

Hugo speaks for the weak and the dispossessed.

He cares.

[slor]

8. Chavez is a Hero of the People!

Viva Chavez!

[PurityOfEssence]

11. Medicine for money is murder

We should have a national health that covers everyone and private medicine for those who can afford it and prefer it. Businesses shouldn't be saddled with health care costs and people shouldn't be slaves to their jobs just to physically survive.

The bottom line is this: prevention is cheaper, and when medical care's expensive, people let conditions progress too far before taking action. The cost of human failure and crisis is just to high and destabilizing for a complex society.

Even Richard Nixon wanted socialized medicine.

[SoCalDem]

12. Governments HAVE money..people NEED medical care

What the HELL is the problem??/ Just PAY doctors what they could receive in the "private sectors"..TRAIN and SCHOOL enough medical workers, and the problem is solved..

Doctors and health care workers make a decent living, and the general public's health improves..

a healthy populace/workforce is a GOOD thing..

If people are healthy, the birthrate becomes manageable, and people are more productive in the workforce..

It may be socialism, but who cares, really?

People should expect something from the government of the place they live..

Government should provide for the general welfare of their citizens. or WHy even have them?

[rman]

21. not to mention that it's the people's money to begin with

the govt wouldn't have any money if the people wouldn't work and pay taxes.

[Javaman]

14. It's amazing what happens when you invest and take care of your own...

moron* could take a few dozen lessons from this guy.

colossal racist failure*.

[Peace Patriot]

15. The Venezuelans vote electronically but with OPEN SOURCE CODE--

that is, anyone may review how the votes are tabulated; whereas in the U.S., as of 2004, our votes are tabulated by two Bushite corporations (Diebold and ES&S) using SECRET, PROPRIETARY source code--code so secret that not even our secretaries of state are permitted to review it.

Open source code = good president.

Secret, proprietary source code = bad president.

Pretty simple, really.

The Venezuelans have a real democracy, and we, at the moment, do not. And as each day here another billion or two is looted from our public coffers to increase the power of warmongers and the super-rich, and as each day more of our once powerful and prosperous middle class sinks into poverty, and more of our poor are tormented and killed by neglect, and as each day goes by that our government denies global warming and fails to address it, and as each day the price of gas gets higher as global corporate predators soak themselves in riches from our misery, and with each "insurgent" we slaughter in unjust, illegal war, and with every anti-civil rights, pro-corporate court appointment, and with every action of the Bush junta, we descend further and further into the hell of fascism.

We have one chance to turn it around: election reform at the state/local level where control over election systems still resides and where ordinary people still have some influence. The bipartisan corruption of our election system at every level of government is a daunting obstacle, but it is most fixable at the state/local level.

We need...

Paper ballots hand-counted at the precinct level (--Canada does it in one day, although speed should not even be a consideration, just accuracy and verifiability)

or, at the least...

Paper ballot (not "paper trail") backup of all electronic voting, a 10% automatic recount, very strict security, and NO SECRET, PROPRIETARY programming code! (...jeez!).

_______

We don't have much time left to save our democracy. Every day that goes by the Bush fascists and the War/corporate Democrats become more entrenched. There is no other issue of importance than Bushite corporations controlling our elections with secret, proprietary source code, because there is NOTHING we can do about ANY ISSUE if we do not have the right to vote! We have LOST the power granted to us by the Founders of our Republic to CHANGE the course of our government.

In Venezuela, the people have gained that power for the first time in their history, by dint of the hard work and passion for democracy of people like Hugo Chavez--and that is WHY they have a decent, people oriented government.

Here, we have lost that power, and THAT is why we DON'T have a decent government.

Like I said, it is quite simple, really. And I continue to be amazed at the ability of our corrupt Democratic Party leadership to fuzz its members' brains about this fundamental fact. We EXPECT Republicans to be corrupt. And that may be the problem. We can't see how much corruption this $4 billion electronic voting machine boondoggle has achieved within our own party, and our own party leaders are covering it up.

---------

Throw Diebold and ES&S election theft machines into 'Boston Harbor' NOW! Demand transparent, verifiable elections!

[goclark]

17. Absolutely ~ Hugo is great! Glad a GOOD man got elected !

[shanti]

16. what a man!

would that we could have a president like him.

[Lisa]

18. also, withdrawal of health care being used as a threat ...

I talked with a woman in the US who works for a large corporation. She wanted to report her boss for making sexual overtures, but was afraid that she would be fired and lose her family health benefits. Basically, the fear that not just she, but her kids as well, would lose vital services, was being used to keep her in line.

After that, I privately vowed that I do NOT want to see my fellow Canadians being pushed around like that ... we had more than a century of being a colony, run by the moneyed elite and "company towns". No wonder a lot of us look on Medicare as being a major force in reshaping the national psyche.

So I hope that the US can figure out a way to protect its people from being violated.

[Bravo411]

23. It'll take a revolution ...

"So I hope that the US can figure out a way to protect its people from being violated."

Sadly it's out Government that is violating the peoples rights in favor of corporate profit and wealth for the elite. It'll take some sort of revolution, probably an armed one before government will do anything to change. I doubt the election system could change the course of our country because it's now a joke (Black Box Voting) and as long as corporations can contribute to political campaigns the elected officials will care more for corporate interests than the interests of the people they are suppose to serve.

Given the shear size of our country, it's not likely that there will ever be a consolidated effort to create any form of rebellion. There are just too many people spread out over too large an area. As a people we can not change things for the better either by bitching or voting. Our only hope is that we can take the Constitution and Bill of Rights as a foundation for building a new government from the ashes after the neo-cons finish plundering and burning to the ground what is left of this nation.

Posted by Bravo411
http://bravo411.blogspot.com

[1932]

19. Amartya Sen's Development as Freedom gives examples of countries that

initiated development by investing in education, health and social services.

The whole point of his argument is that freedom (including the freedom of living long, healthy lives) IS development -- both the means and the ends.

[burrowowl]

20. Damn! What a Christian thing to say!

Why is the Pope mad at him?

[Orrin_73]

22. Hear Hear!!!

[Cocoa]

24. hear that, Dr. Frist?