Want a Radical Face Lift? Try Revolutionary Cuba

Frank Calzon

Retired Argentine soccer super star Diego Maradona arrived in Havana on
Tuesday, reportedly on his way to a drug treatment center in the eastern
city of Holguin. Mr. Maradona, who has a history of drug and alcohol abuse
said, "I trust Cuban medicine and I know they will cure me."

Mr. Maradona's confidence in Cuba's medical system just doesn't square with
what official political and business visitors to Cuba, who get government
"tours" of the country's hospitals, have been reporting about the Cuban
health-care system. Consider Illinois Gov. George Ryan's autumn tour of
Havana's William Soler Pediatric Hospital. Mr. Ryan was so shaken by the
hospital's deplorable conditions that after the visit he blamed the US
embargo of Cuba for shortages of medical supplies and announced a donation
of $1 million worth of medicine from Illinois-based pharmaceutical
companies.

Indeed, what: Mr. Ryan saw was horrible. In February 1998, The Washington
Post reported that: Cubans endure "hospital hallways ... dark for lack of
light bulbs" and "hospitalization [which] is now risky because of the
increased chance of infection; in 1995 dirty water in hospitals led to
infection outbreaks that killed 60 patients and sickened another 289. "

So how do we reconcile the fact that one of the greatest soccer sensations
in history is heading for Cuban health care? The answer is found in the fact
that: there are now two different Cuban health-care systems, one for Cubans
and another for foreign visitors like Mr. Maradona.

The Soler Hospital "tour" is almost a required stop for foreign visitors
because it allows the government to boast about its efforts to care for all
children.

SO THERE IS NO LACK OF MEDICINE, INCLUDING
ANTIBIOTICS, FOR THE HEALTH TOURISM
PROGRAM. BUT THESE ROOMS ARE OFF LIMITS TO
CUBANS AND WERE NOT ON MR. RYAN'S TOUR
SCHEDULE.


At the same time, its disgraceful condition appalls visitors, who are told
that the US Embargo is at fault. What state visitors are not shown, in the
same hospital, are the air conditioned single-occupancy rooms reserved for
foreigners with hard currency. These clinics perform organ transplants and
cosmetic surgery and offer cancer treatments and orthopedic devices, along
with other services and medicines denied to average Cubans.

Cuba's hospital decay can be linked to the government's decision to
increasingly channel its limited resources toward those services that earn
the government hard-currency payments from foreigners. The Cuban government
makes no secret of this, at least outside the country, sending salesmen for
the program abroad regularly and maintaining a Web site for promotion.

Servimed the government agency charged with promoting this program, markets
medical services and products abroad and proclaims itself to be a system
that "has turned out to be a tourist subsystem." Servimed's main function is
to induce thousands of "dollar" patients to visit Cuba for what it calls
"health tourism. "

According to Servimed the Soler Pediatric Hospital's large hospital
facilities" boast 10 single-occupancy rooms ear marked for health tourism."
Cuba buys medicines and other hospital needs, including US made
pharmaceuticals, in Europe and Latin America. Indeed, the embargo does not
block the Clinton administration from issuing licenses to American companies
allowing them to sell medical and agricultural supplies to Cuba. So there is
no lack of medicine, including antibiotics, for the health-tourism program.
But these rooms are off-limits to Cubans and were not on Mr. Ryan's tour
schedule.

This situation is replicated at hospitals throughout the island. Quoting
from Servied, the Cira Garcia Clinic specializes in a "wide range of
pathologies" for foreigners, including executive checkups and cosmetic
surgery. The Placental Histotherapy Center has provided services for more
than 7,000 patients from 100 countries. The Camilo Cienfuegos International
Ophthalmology Center "has 70 single-occupancy rooms with all the comforts of
a medical institution and hotel." The Frank Pais Othopedic Hospital "has
earmarked, in its main building, 24 single-occupancy rooms for health
tourism," offering "18 more rooms, restaurant, commercial center, bar and
snack bar."

The Castro regime's medical apartheid has been denounced by one of Cuba's
most noted scientists, Hilda Molina, founder and a former director of
Havana's International Center for Neurological Restoration. Dr. Molina broke
with the regime and resigned from her high-level position and as a member of
Cuba's National Assembly to protest the dual system. She currently is a
virtual hostage in Havana, denied her former travel privileges and the right
to practice medicine. Her word processor has been confiscated and her
telephone tapped.

In a lengthy document smuggled out of Cuba after her resignation, Dr. Molina
describes a campaign by Cuba to present itself as a "medical superpower"
attractive to foreign patients looking for bargain-basement health care.
Instead, she writes, these patients have often found themselves subject to
substandard, sometimes fraudulent medical care. She tells of a system,
driven solely by the profit motive, rewarding hospital for pushing
unnecessary surgery and other, expensive treatments on foreign patients.

"The lack of adequate professional qualifications, the absence of medical
ethics, and the drive toward financial enrichment characterize Cuba's
medical system and often yield unfortunate results," Dr. Molina states.
"Foreign patients are routinely inadequately or falsely inform about their
medical conditions to increase their medical bills or to hide the fact that
Cuba often advertises medical services it is unable to provide".

Cuban pediatric care, including a low infant-mortality rate, was once a much
heralded achievement of Castro's revolution--despite evidence that the
mortality rate was low mainly as a consequence of the high abortion rate of
high-risk pregnancies. But Mr. Ryan's report on his visit to the pediatric
hospital suggests there are now plenty of sick children without, medicine in
Cuba.

The same regime that wins an amen chorus from Castro sympathizers when it
blames the US for medical shortages advertises Cuba without a hint of
embarrassment as "the ideal destination for your health." By the regime's
own admission, its dual health system amounts to medical
apartheid--deplorable conditions for Cubans as pointed out by the hospital
"tour directors," and "ideal" conditions for foreigners. Medical apartheid
is no differed from other forms of hateful apartheid. US politicians and
businessmen visiting the island should be aware of what lies behind closed
hospital doors.

The Wall Street Journal, January 21, 2000.

http://www.cubacenter.org/media/archives/2000/spring/facelift.html