What nation has the best health care

[Old Rocks]

Of course, this presupposes that "empathy" and "social consciousness" are the standards by which one judges the health care system, and that one is pig-stupid enough to consider WHO's debunked report to be worth the tree-killing required to print it.

Do you have a link that shows the WHO report has been debunked?

No, because this has already been done so much to death on this board that the fact that you are asking AGAIN simply tells me what I already knew about you: that you are a deliberately purblind dumbass who thinks that if you pretend something isn't true long enough, you'll eventually be right. I would no more waste time dignifying you with a repetition of proof than I would piss into the wind and let it blow back in my face.

Now that is a long winded way to say, "No, I don't have a link, because the whole thing I said is a damned lie".

 

[Old Rocks]

I am really suprised Rawanda is not higher up the list, ever since that genocide they have been a leader in organ donation. They have Mega-organ discount stores. You can get a liver and new tires all in a one chop stop shop.

.. ...

::cringe::

From my experience I would have to say the best - relatively speaking - is by far and away Cuba.

If you look at the graph on the previous page, you can see that Cuba spends next to no money on health care, and yet has a life expectancy equivalent to the US. crazy

Perhaps we should be looking at what all these other nations do right, instead of just looking at ways to dis their systems as a way of dissing President Obama. The idea is to create a health care system within the US that does not bankrupt us, and delivers at least the results that Cuba gets.

 

[Harry Dresden]

Do you have a link that shows the WHO report has been debunked?

No, because this has already been done so much to death on this board that the fact that you are asking AGAIN simply tells me what I already knew about you: that you are a deliberately purblind dumbass who thinks that if you pretend something isn't true long enough, you'll eventually be right. I would no more waste time dignifying you with a repetition of proof than I would piss into the wind and let it blow back in my face.

Now that is a long winded way to say, "No, I don't have a link, because the whole thing I said is a damned lie".

its what she said dipshit....you have to show Political Junky things over and over because...either Junky is to lazy to review the threads or reads them but doesnt retain anything.....and you have a lot of balls Rocks,saying someone lies and embellishes something when you do it a good majority of the times you post.....you also dance around questions a lot....so stick that in your fucking pipe and smoke it.....

 

[Harry Dresden]

I am really suprised Rawanda is not higher up the list, ever since that genocide they have been a leader in organ donation. They have Mega-organ discount stores. You can get a liver and new tires all in a one chop stop shop.

.. ...

::cringe::

From my experience I would have to say the best - relatively speaking - is by far and away Cuba.

If you look at the graph on the previous page, you can see that Cuba spends next to no money on health care, and yet has a life expectancy equivalent to the US. crazy

Perhaps we should be looking at what all these other nations do right, instead of just looking at ways to dis their systems as a way of dissing President Obama. The idea is to create a health care system within the US that does not bankrupt us, and delivers at least the results that Cuba gets.

Rocks go to the poor parts of Cuba....and tell me how good the medical is that the poor there get....they cant even get stuff like Neosporin.....a friend of mine who was born there and has family there sends his Aunt a few tubes every year at Christmas and has to do it DHL and it costs way more than what the stuff costs, just to send it.....so yea believe the Michael Moore cherry picking shit......

 

[Cecilie1200]

To which country do most people from other nations go for treatment, when they can choose to do so?

The US, if one is very wealthy. It's about access, not quality.
Cons have a "let them eat cake" attitude about healthcare.

Simply, and absolutely not true. The US isn't even in the "top 40" medical destinations. Neither for price, OR quality of care.

-sensored

Really? And whose "top 40" is that, exactly? Based on what criteria?

 

[KittenKoder]

In my opinion, every nation on the globe has a poor health care system. Pick a nation and you will easily be able to find negative aspects to it. For example, I believed that France had the best health care in the world when I heard a positive news story on it and read that it was ranked #1 on the globe by the WHO. However, what I didn't realize at the time was that this is the leading cause of their debt. What is even more troubling is that the system paid for mostly by the employers at this nation. In fact, an employer is responsible to pay nearly 13% of each employees salary! Needless to say, but if a system like this would be implemented in the US, a number of small companies will go out of business and less foreign entrepreneurs would look here to do business. I am meaning to pick on France, but I think that what should be the best health care system in the world should be a good one also.

I had a stomach bug a few weeks ago. I went to see my regular doctor. I called around 8:30 a.m. for an appointment and she couldn't see me until 1:15 p.m. Then she wanted me to see a GI doctor and I didn't see him until the next morning. They prescribed an antispasmodic (copay $0) and that worked. I swear, these wait times in the US are absolutely ridiculous.

In Japan, waiting times are so short that most patients don't bother to make an appointment. One Thursday morning in Tokyo, I called the prestigious orthopedic clinic at Keio University Hospital to schedule a consultation about my aching shoulder. "Why don't you just drop by?" the receptionist said. That same afternoon, I was in the surgeon's office. Dr. Nakamichi recommended an operation. "When could we do it?" I asked. The doctor checked his computer and said, "Tomorrow would be pretty difficult. Perhaps some day next week?"
By T.R. Reid -- Five Myths About Health Care in the Rest of the World - washingtonpost.com

Bullshit:
The Pros and Cons of a Japan-Like Healthcare System -- Seeking Alpha

 

[JakeStarkey]

Taiwan is every bit as quick as Japan. The systems are awesome, and KK's article above is merely nonsense. I wish the fundies would talk honestly and openly about the woeful state of our health care system compared to other western and eastern industrialized nations. Let's face it, folks: we sux.

 

[Ame®icano]

I would like to know how many illegal immigrants are in Cuba, Taiwan & Japan?

 

[SmarterThanHick]

Perhaps we should be looking at what all these other nations do right, instead of just looking at ways to dis their systems as a way of dissing President Obama. The idea is to create a health care system within the US that does not bankrupt us, and delivers at least the results that Cuba gets.

They have ample choices among many non-profit insurance companies that are disincentivized to make "mistakes" which conveniently make them money. If they don't pay within 3 days, your next month of insurance is free. They don't sue their doctors over trivial things. That's a good start.

Rocks go to the poor parts of Cuba....and tell me how good the medical is that the poor there get....they cant even get stuff like Neosporin.....a friend of mine who was born there and has family there sends his Aunt a few tubes every year at Christmas and has to do it DHL and it costs way more than what the stuff costs, just to send it.....so yea believe the Michael Moore cherry picking shit......

Say what you want - they spent barely any money on health care and they're living just as long as we are. I doubt it's just because people are shipping over neosporin.

Bullshit:
The Pros and Cons of a Japan-Like Healthcare System -- Seeking Alpha

oh good, you're refuting extensive journalistic integrity from the washington post with... an online blog.

And what is the claim of that blog? Not that Japan's system is failing now, despite being successful for quite some time, but that it may fail at some point in the future. Bravo.

I would like to know how many illegal immigrants are in Cuba, Taiwan & Japan?

Oh so you're saying we pay double the cost of healthcare than Japan and get lower life expectancies because half the cost is going towards illegal immigrants?

 

[frazzledgear]

In my opinion, every nation on the globe has a poor health care system. Pick a nation and you will easily be able to find negative aspects to it. For example, I believed that France had the best health care in the world when I heard a positive news story on it and read that it was ranked #1 on the globe by the WHO. However, what I didn't realize at the time was that this is the leading cause of their debt. What is even more troubling is that the system paid for mostly by the employers at this nation. In fact, an employer is responsible to pay nearly 13% of each employees salary! Needless to say, but if a system like this would be implemented in the US, a number of small companies will go out of business and less foreign entrepreneurs would look here to do business. I am meaning to pick on France, but I think that what should be the best health care system in the world should be a good one also.

Healthcare is expensive. Good healthcare is very expensive. Someone has to pay for it. So who do you think should pay for it?

Who pays for the REAL necessities in life? Every one of us requires food, shelter and clothing to protect us against the elements. Without these things we would die and die pretty miserably too. Who pays for those? Who is EXPECTED to pay for them? Who do you think should pay for them? If you eat more food than I do, who should pay for that? If you live in a bigger house made of more expensive stuff than mine -who should pay for that?

Unlike food, shelter and clothing -healthcare is not a necessity, it is not something we each need just to survive. Only SOME of us NEED healthcare just to survive. The rest of us utilize the system only to improve the quality of our lives which is actually no different from our decisions we make regarding shelter and clothing to improve the quality of our lives. But since the appearance of third party payers, we utilize that system for times we never would have if we had to pay for that service in full at the time of service.

Insurance companies exist to make money -they can't stay in business to even offer you insurance unless they are paying out less on medical care for those they insured than those people are paying in premiums. But it is THIS system that is flawed and needs to be changed -a government takeover only permanently institutionalizes the flaws and insures its eventual collapse. As the French, who have an incredibly heavy tax burden both on individuals as well as small businesses BECAUSE of their healthcare system which still isn't paying its own way -can already see coming in their near future.

Let's use something other than healthcare to realize what is really wrong with this system that will never be "cured" by government takeover. Suppose we had "food insurance" -where you paid the insurance company a yearly premium. In exchange that company paid for the food you brought home from the grocery store minus a small co-pay that was the same no matter how much food you decided to bring home -or how often you went to the grocery store. Would you REALLY expect to see the cost of food drop under such a system? Would you REALLY expect to see people utilize grocery stores MORE efficiently than they do under our system now? Would people make BETTER decisions about when to go to the grocery store than they do now? Would you REALLY expect to see your yearly premiums remain unchanged under such a system? Who really benefits by such a system -only those who OVER-UTILIZE it would benefit, thereby encouraging more people to also over-utilize it. As it becomes overburdened it becomes less responsive and less efficient. We would experience food shortages, delays in even being able to get in to the grocery store -even when we really did NEED to go. More and more people would end up standing in lines for hours only to go home empty handed. Hunger would actually increase under such a system. And why should the co-pay remain the same for everyone regardless of how much food they brought home or how often they went to the grocery store?

Just like ANY other product or service -if you use more of it than the next person, then it should be a larger part of YOUR budget in comparison to the next person. What it would REALLY take to lower healthcare costs this nation will never do -get rid of all third party payers. But the vast majority of people pay more in premiums than they would voluntarily choose to pay for healthcare if they paid for the service directly instead of indirectly to a third party. But that isn't going to happen -we have deluded ourselves into believing that paying out more each year to a third party is less than we would have paid directly. Which is only true for a small minority -or the insurance companies would have gone bankrupt decades ago. But since we won't do that, then co-pays must be tiered -your co-pay gets higher each time you go to the doctor. NOTHING IS FREE and unless people understand and FEEL the relationship between the service they desire and their pocketbook, the costs for everyone will only go higher and higher as the system becomes less responsive and more inefficient.

We have made sure that those who cannot provide food, shelter and clothing for themselves receive it and we can figure out how to provide healthcare for those who TRULY cannot afford it or would be financially destroyed by a catastrophic illness without destroying the entire system for everyone else who is actually not unhappy with how that system works for them in the first place!

 

[oreo]

In my opinion, every nation on the globe has a poor health care system. Pick a nation and you will easily be able to find negative aspects to it. For example, I believed that France had the best health care in the world when I heard a positive news story on it and read that it was ranked #1 on the globe by the WHO. However, what I didn't realize at the time was that this is the leading cause of their debt. What is even more troubling is that the system paid for mostly by the employers at this nation. In fact, an employer is responsible to pay nearly 13% of each employees salary! Needless to say, but if a system like this would be implemented in the US, a number of small companies will go out of business and less foreign entrepreneurs would look here to do business. I am meaning to pick on France, but I think that what should be the best health care system in the world should be a good one also.

Healthcare is expensive. Good healthcare is very expensive. Someone has to pay for it. So who do you think should pay for it?

Well--we all have to pay for it. Since--we're talking about France--every so often you will see youth rioting in the streets. Reason--they can't find jobs. A "good" unemployment rate for France is 12%. In America that spells disaster. Stiffing employers with the medical insurance bill will only dramatically reduce the number of available jobs in this country.

Therefore, cost of medical insurance needs to be shared by both employers & employees.

 

[Christopher]

Say what you want - they spent barely any money on health care and they're living just as long as we are. I doubt it's just because people are shipping over neosporin.

Americans are known overall for being unhealthy, by choice. We eat too much and do not exercise enough.

As far as decreasing costs to match Cuba’s, maybe we should start paying our doctors and physicians $15 per month like Cuba does. Problem solved, right?

 

[Wry Catcher]

The one thing I never get from all the words posted in non-support of health care (insurance) reform is unenlightened. It seems the entire argument offered by the supporters of "NO" can be summed up in a few words or short phrases.
Not the Republican leadership, not the AM political philosophers nor their TV seers and not the trolls who learn from these totally partisan forces can give reason to support the status quo or practical alternatives to what clearly doesn't work; deniers, demagoguerers and denigrators all.

 

[frazzledgear]

To which country do most people from other nations go for treatment, when they can choose to do so?

The US, if one is very wealthy. It's about access, not quality.
Cons have a "let them eat cake" attitude about healthcare.

I just love these BROAD generalizations about conservatives -but always ones that indict all conservatives for being inhumane and uncaring, right? Get off that crap already. It serves no purpose except for you to indulge yourself in a phony moment pretending you are more "righteous" and more "caring" somehow -all because conservatives disagree with you about how to best achieve a goal that is desirable to all. Conservatives also believe we need to reform our healthcare system -but unlike YOU, they do not believe that a government takeover, even when done in a sneaky backdoor manner -will produce the desired result. And they actually have more to back up their argument than the same stupid argument that a government takeover will somehow make things better. I can't get over liberals still deluding themselves to believe government is best suited to takeover and run the entire healthcare industry when they totally screwed up a small program in the first WEEK just a month or so ago that ended up costing taxpayers BILLIONS more than was estimated just for that small program! Got the cost estimates all wrong and it ended up costing 4 times as much as was estimated - but oh sure, they got it all right for taking over healthcare and those 1200 pages of their garbage healthcare bill really won't add a single dime to our out-of-control budget deficit! Give me a break. ROFL

The left cannot think outside the same stupid box -whatever the problem the left can only offer the same stupid answer of "MORE GOVERNMENT". "Government" is very rarely the only possible answer to ANY problem and even more rarely is it the BEST answer -and unlike the left, conservatives actually look at RESULTS before forming their opinion.

Liberals are irrational idealists who give little to zero thought about the actual results and outcome - because they can't stop patting themselves on the back about how "humane" and "caring" they are compared to those "mean, bad" conservatives. Liberals reject solutions that are known for a fact to produce the desired result for no other reason except that the manner in which it does doesn't allow them to FEEL like it is the most "caring" way. Liberals insist that whatever they FEEL defines "truth" for them -in spite of the indisputable fact that feelings are so often completely irrational and so easily subject to interpreting reality incorrectly (the stupid chant that conservatives are uncaring is a fine case in point). Instead of wallowing in useless FEELINGS, conservatives THINK rationally and believe that RESULTS matter the most even if the means for producing the best results seem counterintuitive at first glance. Tax cuts are a case in point. Conservatives don't like tax cuts because they think the rich aren't rich enough yet -but because they WORK and they work better than the 2nd best means of stimulating the economy which is a far distant 2nd. If the problem is a declining economy then the solution is stimulating the economy as quickly and effectively as possible. And across-the-board tax cuts are THE best at doing that. No close second. But liberals believe it would be more "caring and feeling" to try and use that opportunity as a means of redistributing the wealth. Even though it would provably only further drag down the economy. You don't get the desired results and it actually increases human misery -but HEY, you get to PRETEND you were the more "caring" one, right? ROFL Liberals would rather indulge themselves with the phony APPEARANCE of caring -over actually getting the desired results! Which is why I decided a long time ago that I'd rather swim with the fishes than be a liberal.

The focus and goal of our healthcare system for nearly a century was to figure out how to return the ill to health quickly in order to extend life expectancy and improve the quality of life to the very end at the same time. That is because the understanding that the elderly have contributed to the nation far more than any young person -that young person will not have equaled that contribution until they too are old. And therefore a decent society owed their elderly good medical care and the best quality of life they were capable of during their last years. Under government run systems that is provably changed to "life is only for the young and healthy so hurry up and DIE you unwanted burden".

Don't kid yourself that it isn't -Obama worded it slightly differently but that is exactly what he meant when he said we needed to change our healthcare system from one that treated diseases and medical conditions -to one that prevented illness. That may sound like it makes sense to you -except for a few really big problems. The actual RESULTS.

1. To turn the system into a preventative one can only be done at the expense of those who ARE ill -resources must be diverted from being able to treat the ill in order to try and prevent illness in the healthy. It is a fact that as we age we NEED healthcare more than when we were younger. In general the young are healthy and the elderly much less so after decades of exposure, whatever genetics are in play and a life of labor. So in order to change a healthcare system into one that focuses on those who don't need it, you MUST deny it to those who do. Real caring, right? LOL

2. Preventative medicine doesn't work -and that is a proven fact. Proven repeatedly. It is cost ineffective and a complete inefficient and irresponsible waste of limited resources. The rates people fall ill with those conditions and how ill they get from them are completely unchanged. In some cases preventative medicine has CAUSED the condition it was trying to prevent -i.e. yearly mammograms to detect breast cancer now linked to causing breast cancer because of repeated radiation exposure. The only thing that is changed is the amount of money thrown away and getting absolutely nothing in return for it. Real caring.

3. Doctors are not trained to treat healthy people. They are educated and trained to identify, diagnose, distinguish between self-limiting disease and diseases that require a doctor's intervention -and treat those that require a doctor's intervention. In other words doctors are trained to treat SICK PEOPLE, not healthy people. They spend YEARS learning how to do this. So Obama must think medical schools all need to be overhauled as well so doctors learn how to treat young, healthy people for no illness whatsoever and not spend so much time on how to treat diseases, right? This represents progress how? And just bubbling with that caring stuff, right?

Anyone who really believes we would have a better healthcare system by focusing on how to keep healthy people healthy instead of returning people to health once they fall ill along with government takeover (either outright or in piecemeal fashion) is ignorant and so busy patting themselves on the back about how righteous they are for FEELING so much -that they don't have any time left over to actually research what RESULTS from different proposals when put into practice. But we undoubtedly would be able to claim that many more people are receiving really lousy healthcare and therefore must be more "equal" -which is good enough for most liberals. The goal should be to have as few as possible falling through the net receiving no or poor healthcare, right? Socialized medicine works by making it look more "fair" by having more people on the bottom receiving poor healthcare, not fewer. Having more people equally miserable and more people having less access to decent healthcare is not progress -and certainly nothing for any liberal to be patting himself on the back about. Since that reality contradicts the liberal's claim to be more "caring" -I choose to use my brain instead, think things through unemotionally, do unbiased research and realize that what matters most is not whether I FEEL "caring" enough at the end of it -but whether it produces the desired RESULTS or not. In other words, I choose to be one of those "bad, mean" conservatives.

 

[Christopher]

The one thing I never get from all the words posted in non-support of health care (insurance) reform is unenlightened. It seems the entire argument offered by the supporters of "NO" can be summed up in a few words or short phrases.
Not the Republican leadership, not the AM political philosophers nor their TV seers and not the trolls who learn from these totally partisan forces can give reason to support the status quo or practical alternatives to what clearly doesn't work; deniers, demagoguerers and denigrators all.

I am one who is not against health care reform, but I am against reform that makes the government a bigger health insurance provider. I am against reform which does not do what the supporters of it say it will do. I am against reform which bankrupts the US even further.

 

[Big_D]

In my opinion, every nation on the globe has a poor health care system. Pick a nation and you will easily be able to find negative aspects to it. For example, I believed that France had the best health care in the world when I heard a positive news story on it and read that it was ranked #1 on the globe by the WHO. However, what I didn't realize at the time was that this is the leading cause of their debt. What is even more troubling is that the system paid for mostly by the employers at this nation. In fact, an employer is responsible to pay nearly 13% of each employees salary! Needless to say, but if a system like this would be implemented in the US, a number of small companies will go out of business and less foreign entrepreneurs would look here to do business. I am meaning to pick on France, but I think that what should be the best health care system in the world should be a good one also.

Healthcare is expensive. Good healthcare is very expensive. Someone has to pay for it. So who do you think should pay for it?

Well--we all have to pay for it. Since--we're talking about France--every so often you will see youth rioting in the streets. Reason--they can't find jobs. A "good" unemployment rate for France is 12%. In America that spells disaster. Stiffing employers with the medical insurance bill will only dramatically reduce the number of available jobs in this country.

Therefore, cost of medical insurance needs to be shared by both employers & employees.

Where are you getting this info from? According to the link below, France's health care is less than 10% and lower than America's.

 

[Harry Dresden]

Rocks go to the poor parts of Cuba....and tell me how good the medical is that the poor there get....they cant even get stuff like Neosporin.....a friend of mine who was born there and has family there sends his Aunt a few tubes every year at Christmas and has to do it DHL and it costs way more than what the stuff costs, just to send it.....so yea believe the Michael Moore cherry picking shit......

Say what you want - they spent barely any money on health care and they're living just as long as we are. I doubt it's just because people are shipping over neosporin.

if they cant get stuff we can buy over the counter.....how is their system better?.....and remember...this guys Aunt And Uncle live in a town of around 5,000 people on the other side of the Island...the Uncle has a few health problems,and he is very limited as to the help the Hospital and Docs in city can give him.....

 

[Big_D]

We have made sure that those who cannot provide food, shelter and clothing for themselves receive it and we can figure out how to provide healthcare for those who TRULY cannot afford it or would be financially destroyed by a catastrophic illness without destroying the entire system for everyone else who is actually not unhappy with how that system works for them in the first place!

This last paragraph says it all. Just look at Hawaii's attempt at universal health care. It was shut down because people who could afford decided to have the govt take care of the bill for them. I don't think it was a terrible idea but these people ruined it for everyone. Now, I am not boasting America's system as it is horrible how much a family of five would have to pay for health care. But, this furthers my point how there is no good health care system on this planet. To get back to France, I found this article that describes the true price for health care in that nation:

A Frenchman making a monthly salary of 3,000 euros will pay approximately 350 of them (deducted by his employer) for health insurance. Then the employer will add approximately 1,200 euros, making the total monthly cost to the employer of this individual’s services not 3,000 euros but 4,200. High labor costs in France affect not only consumer prices but also unemployment rates, since employers are reluctant to pay so much for low-skill workers. Economists agree that unemployment rates and the cost of national health insurance are directly related everywhere, which partly explains why even in periods of economic growth, the average French unemployment rate hovers around 10 percent.

‘Free’ French Healthcare: Paying For ‘Le Treatment’ « Sigmund, Carl and Alfred

The French might not be paying a monetary rate per month for health care but they are paying for it with their high employment costs.

 

[SmarterThanHick]

As far as decreasing costs to match Cuba’s, maybe we should start paying our doctors and physicians $15 per month like Cuba does. Problem solved, right?

They also have the second highest doctor to patient ratio in the world. Supply and demand. Kinda helps.

if they cant get stuff we can buy over the counter.....how is their system better?

You can speculate how you'd like, but they live about as long as we do.

 

[frazzledgear]

Perhaps we should be looking at what all these other nations do right, instead of just looking at ways to dis their systems as a way of dissing President Obama. The idea is to create a health care system within the US that does not bankrupt us, and delivers at least the results that Cuba gets.

They have ample choices among many non-profit insurance companies that are disincentivized to make "mistakes" which conveniently make them money. If they don't pay within 3 days, your next month of insurance is free. They don't sue their doctors over trivial things. That's a good start.

Rocks go to the poor parts of Cuba....and tell me how good the medical is that the poor there get....they cant even get stuff like Neosporin.....a friend of mine who was born there and has family there sends his Aunt a few tubes every year at Christmas and has to do it DHL and it costs way more than what the stuff costs, just to send it.....so yea believe the Michael Moore cherry picking shit......

Say what you want - they spent barely any money on health care and they're living just as long as we are. I doubt it's just because people are shipping over neosporin.

Bullshit:
The Pros and Cons of a Japan-Like Healthcare System -- Seeking Alpha

oh good, you're refuting extensive journalistic integrity from the washington post with... an online blog.

And what is the claim of that blog? Not that Japan's system is failing now, despite being successful for quite some time, but that it may fail at some point in the future. Bravo.

I would like to know how many illegal immigrants are in Cuba, Taiwan & Japan?

Oh so you're saying we pay double the cost of healthcare than Japan and get lower life expectancies because half the cost is going towards illegal immigrants?

You have some big misconceptions about the quality of Cuban healthcare -which would be laughable except it is so pervasive among the left who love communist dictators and are so convinced that putting a communist dictator in charge of everything and everyone can only result in heaven on earth.

Let's all start off by admiring the Cuban income tax rate -it is 50% and that isn't counting the money they confiscate from citizens in the form of many other taxes. In exchange for having the bulk of their income confiscated and existing as a captive labor force, Cubans have gotten a two-tiered healthcare system in exchange. The top tier is accessible only to the power elite and tourists. The Cubans pay for it, but they are forbidden from using it. It is also the system that is shown to those self-deluded, gullible foreigners intending to make a "documentary" braying about how well Cuba manages their healthcare or will write an admiring article about how that tiny nation got it all right while the big, bad US has it all screwed up. It is a total crock of shit.

While Cubans are heavily taxed to pay for that top tier, they live under medical apartheid. They get the bottom tier -and that tier makes the worst day under the UK's overburdened, inefficient and unresponsive healthcare system look like a dream come true. That bottom tier suffers routinely from a lack of basic supplies and medications because of the severe funding shortage. The bottom tier hospitals and clinics are decrepit, dirty and understaffed. The bulk of funds set aside for healthcare in Cuba go for that top tier the elite have claimed for themselves but is off limits to those actually footing the bill for it.

As for their incredible claims that this apartheid medical system has produced the same kind of life expectancy and other impressive healthcare statistics on a par or even better than some of the best healthcare systems in the world -as well as claiming to have THE lowest infant mortality rate in the world -you should know that it is generally accepted in the REAL world that these statistics coming from Cuba are not reliable whatsoever because they are the result of SELF REPORTING and always unconfirmed -in fact Cuba will not allow any attempt to confirm them. Like all egomaniacal dictators, the Castros like to pose to the outside world as saviors of their own people, pretending they provide that heaven on earth that all others can only envy. ROFL

So when you look at how Cuba determines their infant mortality rate for example -which they CLAIM is the best in the whole world - you find out it is a sick, sick pathetic joke.

The World Health Organization does not require that all countries follow a uniform system of determining its health statistics -that is determined by each country. And once they receive the data from countries, they publish and report it -but put the part of the different standards each country uses in a different publication. This makes it totally impossible to truly compare healthcare statistics that are gathered by means of totally different standards -and sometimes are outright lies. Especially from the the most oppressive regimes trying to pose as being the equals of the best the free world has to offer.

This is how the US has chosen to determine its infant mortality rate. The US counts all live births regardless of the gestational age at the time of birth. If the child is born alive, it counts as a live birth. The US counts all infant deaths for the first 12 months following birth. In fact the US has the longest counting periods for infant deaths in the entire world. The average counting period is six months.

Cuba does not count as a live birth any child born before 26 weeks gestation -because they don't survive there anyway. (Cuba is not alone in deciding not to count the live births of extremely premature babies -for the same reason.) But babies born in the US at 24 weeks have an 85% chance of survival today and the youngest to survive was born at 22 weeks. In the US if a child was born alive and then dies even a few minutes later, it is counted as a live birth and that death becomes part of our infant mortality stats. In Cuba (which again, is not alone in this), if a baby is born alive but then dies within the first 24 hours of birth, it is counted as a miscarriage -not a live birth followed by a death. And finally, in Cuba, they stop counting infant deaths after THREE MONTHS.

There is nothing admirable about Cuba and certainly not about their medical apartheid system they have inflicted on their own people while forcing them to foot the bill for the top tier for government officials and tourists but forbidden to access it themselves. To say nothing of the fact their people are among the very bottom of the least free people in the world, exploited as a captive labor force by the communist regime, suffer under a punitive tax burden that amounts to outright confiscation of income, the regime routinely imprisons political prisoners and at any given time has hundreds of political prsioners held in abysmal and inhumane conditions. Anyone want to take bets on what kind of medical care they get? And every year more than 2,000 Cubans decide to risk their lives to flee this oppressive regime using anything they think will float long enough to reach our shore.

You know there is something wrong with a country when it tries to prevent its own citizens from leaving. The idea of that happening here is ludicrous, isn't it? You want to leave here because you think some other country does it better than we do? Have at it and don't let the door hit you in the butt on your way out. Because no one is going to stop you.