{"id":800178,"date":"2022-09-15T20:54:45","date_gmt":"2022-09-15T20:54:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dissidentvoice.org\/?p=133397"},"modified":"2022-09-15T20:54:45","modified_gmt":"2022-09-15T20:54:45","slug":"life-expectancy-the-us-and-cuba-in-the-time-of-covid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2022\/09\/15\/life-expectancy-the-us-and-cuba-in-the-time-of-covid\/","title":{"rendered":"Life Expectancy: The US and Cuba in the Time of Covid"},"content":{"rendered":"

Recent data shows that between 2019 and 2021, life expectancy (LE) in the US plunged almost three years while for Cuba<\/a> it edged up 0.2 years.\u00a0 Yet, in 1960, the year after its revolution, Cuba had a LE of \u00a064.2 years, lower by 5.6 years than that in the US (69.8 years).\u00a0 As I document in Cuban Health Care<\/em><\/a>, the island quickly caught up to the US and, from 1970 through 2016, the two countries were nip and tuck, with some years Cuba and other years the US, having a longer LE. But neither country was ever as much as one year of LE ahead of the other.<\/p>\n

Life Expectancy (LE) in US and Cuba, 2017-2021<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<\/colgroup>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
<\/td>\n\n

Year<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

LE US <\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

LE <\/span>Cuba<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

US – Cuba<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

<\/td>\n\n

2021<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

76.1<\/span>*<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

79.0<\/span>\u2021<\/span><\/span><\/sup><\/a><\/u><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

– 2.9<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

<\/td>\n\n

2020<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

78.8<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2020<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/sup><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

7<\/span>8.9<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2021<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/sup><\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

-0.1<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

<\/td>\n\n

2019<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

79.0<\/span>*<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

7<\/span>8.8<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2021<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/sup><\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

+0.2<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

<\/td>\n\n

2018<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

78.7<\/span>\u2020<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/sup><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

7<\/span>8.7<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2021<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/sup><\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

0.0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

<\/td>\n\n

2017<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

78.6<\/span>\u2020<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/sup><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

7<\/span>8.6<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u2021<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/sup><\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

0.0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

This continued through the beginning of Covid, which sharply changed the pattern.\u00a0 LE in the US suddenly dropped behind that in Cuba.\u00a0 Bernd Debusmann Jr. of BBC News<\/em> wrote<\/a>, LE in the US fell \u201cto the lowest level seen since 1996.\u00a0 Government data showed LE at birth now stands at 76.1 compared to 79 in 2019. That is the steepest two-year decline in a century.\u201d\u00a0 From 2019 to 2020<\/a>, \u201cLE declined in all 50 states and the District of Columbia”.<\/p>\n

How could a country with all the problems of Cuba, actually have LE almost three years greater than the US?\u00a0 There were enormous differences between the way the countries responded to Covid.<\/p>\n

The Covid Contrast<\/strong><\/p>\n

US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data confirmed that \u201cCovid-19<\/a> was the main contributing factor [to changes in LE].\u00a0 The statistics show that Covid-19 accounted for 50% of the decline between 2020 and 2021. Between 2019 and 2020, the pandemic contributed to 74% of the decline.\u201d<\/p>\n

A critical divergence between the two countries is that Cuba guarantees health care to all as a human right while the US system is based on profit and political grandstanding.\u00a0 When Covid hit, the US dawdled for months as Cuba mobilized for medical action.<\/p>\n

The Ministry of Health developed a national strategy before the island\u2019s first victim had succumbed to the disease.\u00a0 Cuban TV carried daily press conferences with detailed info on the status of new patients, results of cabinet meetings on Covid, and announcing the best way for citizens to protect themselves and others.\u00a0 Social distancing, masks and contact tracing were universally accepted.<\/p>\n

Each day Cuban medical students knocked on doors to ask citizens how they were.\u00a0 Students\u2019 tasks included obtaining survey data from residents and making extra visits to the elderly, infants and those with respiratory problems.\u00a0 Clinic staff dealt with issues that doctors were unable to cope with and sent patients they could not care for to hospitals.\u00a0 Medical data was used by those in the highest decision-making positions of the country.\u00a0 In this way, every Cuban citizen and every health care worker, from those at neighborhood doctor offices through those at the most esteemed research institutes, had a part in determining health policy.<\/p>\n

This inclusive approach resulted in Cuba\u2019s having 87 Covid deaths by July 21, 2020, when the US had experienced 140,300.\u00a0 While the US population is 30 times that of Cuba, it had 1613 times as many deaths.<\/p>\n

Two aspects of Cuba\u2019s response to Covid stand out.\u00a0 First, Cuba does NOT have more money to spend on health care.\u00a0 It actually spends less than a tenth<\/a> as much per person per year than does the US, but it spends that wisely on a holistic system.\u00a0 Second, Cuba\u2019s health care is global \u2013 it continued its practice of sending thousands of medical staff to other countries during Covid.<\/p>\n

Over the past six decades<\/a> more than 400,000 Cuban medical professionals have worked in 164 countries and improved the lives of hundreds of millions of people.\u00a0 In addition to providing Cuban doctors with experience coping with diseases and medical issues they do not see at home, this action is positive global diplomacy.\u00a0 US diplomacy, on the other hand, seems to focus on threatening to harm people and\/or actually harming them.<\/p>\n

In Addition to Covid <\/strong><\/p>\n

News stories<\/a> also mentioned other factors associated with the shorter LE in the US: drug overdoses, heart disease, chronic liver disease and cirrhosis and suicides.\u00a0 The corporate press also acknowledged racial disparities.<\/p>\n

There had been progress in reducing LE differences between Black and white Americans.\u00a0 This was reversed<\/a> during 2018 \u2013 2020 when LE went down 1.36 years for whites, 3.25 years for Hispanics, and 3.88 years for Blacks.<\/p>\n

The fall in US life expectancy was even more pronounced among Native Americans and Alaska Natives.\u00a0 Since 2019, it \u201cdropped by 6.6 years<\/a>, more than twice that of the wider US population.\u201d<\/p>\n

The US has multiple groups who reject government attempts to vaccinate or wear masks.\u00a0 Most loud-mouthed, of course, are the right wingers who lividly despise the very idea of public health campaigns.\u00a0 While their thought processes are hallucination-based, people of color have reality-based fears of being ignored, lied to, and used for government experimentation, such as the Tuskegee Syphilis Study.\u00a0 There is a strong connection between vaccination hesitation and racism.<\/p>\n

What They Did Not Look At <\/strong><\/p>\n

Among factors with increasing US Covid rates ignored by corporate media in the US are poverty, an acute rise in misinformation, abortion, the embargo against Cuba and preparation for climate change.<\/p>\n

Poverty<\/strong>. The first task of the Cuban revolution was to simultaneously address poverty, food, sanitation, literacy, education, racism and housing, which the rebels saw as parts of unitary whole.\u00a0 During the Covid crisis, many US corporations were determined to force low wage workers to stay at their jobs, spreading the disease.\u00a0 Cuba told those with Covid to stay home.<\/p>\n

Misinformation<\/strong>.\u00a0 Discussions of Covid deaths must not ignore the deadly role of science denial. \u00a0At the same time Trump was foolishly downplaying mounting dangers of Covid, Cuba was far along developing its \u201cNovel Coronavirus Plan for Prevention and Control.\u201d\u00a0 Trump was not and is not an isolated individual \u2013 he manifests a life-threatening movement toward lunacy.\u00a0 Cuba has no significant group which confronts Covid with a bottle of Clorox or expects a cure brought by Q Anon on a flying saucer.<\/p>\n

Abortion<\/strong>. Cuba also does not have a \u201cWomen\u2019s Lives Don\u2019t Matter!\u201d movement seeking to eliminate abortion rights.\u00a0 Those who do not want an abortion do not get one and people do not seek to impose their religious and spiritual beliefs on others.\u00a0 The Supreme Court\u2019s allowing states to criminalize abortion will cause many women to die, due both from self-attempts at abortion and lack of its availability.\u00a0 LE averages are impacted more by deaths of young than elderly; so, we can expect many abortion-induced deaths in US will be among teenagers and young women, which will affect LE.<\/p>\n

Embargo<\/strong>.\u00a0 The \u201ctrade sanctions\u201d or \u201cblockade\u201d or \u201cembargo\u201d have a special relationship with LE in Cuba: one might expect it to decrease LE; but it has not done so.\u00a0 When Cuba was reeling from the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union, the US passed laws intending to punish those who continued to trade with it.\u00a0 This raised prices in the already impoverished country and has prevented or slowed the arrival of much life-saving medical equipment.\u00a0 Yet, due to its prioritizing health care during the 1990s, Cuba\u2019s infant mortality decreased while its LE showed a slight increase.<\/p>\n

International solidarity movements have stepped in to help Cuba overcome many embargo effects. Lack of essential material prevented Cuba from performing liver transplants<\/a> in children.\u00a0 But, during May 2022, Puentes de Amor<\/em><\/a> (Bridges of Love) delivered the vital chemical compound to the William Soler Pediatric Hospital.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Resilience<\/strong>.\u00a0 Avoiding the use of fossil fuels and enormous hydro-, solar- and wind-projects, as Cuba does, will cut down on global destructiveness but have very little effect on reducing climate change on the island.\u00a0 However, preparing for resilience<\/a> in the face of climate change can hugely affect its quality of life.<\/p>\n

In March 2022 (p. 8) Scientific American<\/em><\/a> editors wrote that most important in preparing for the next pandemic is \u201cbuilding new systems.\u201d Unfortunately, this is what the US is avoiding as it becomes absorbed in making minor tweaks to outmoded, inadequate systems of environmental protection.<\/p>\n

Cuba has been holding Basti\u00f3n<\/em> (bulwark) events involving as many as four million citizens who carry out food production, disease control, sanitation and safeguarding medical supplies.\u00a0 When a policy change is introduced, government representatives go to each community, including the most remote rural ones, to make sure that everyone knows the threats that climate change poses to their lives and how they can alter behaviors to minimize them.\u00a0 They include such diverse actions<\/a> as conservation with energy use, saving water, preventing fires and using medical products sparingly.<\/p>\n

Another energy positive being expanded in Cuba is farms being run entirely on agroecology principles.\u00a0 Such farms can produce 12 times the energy they consume.\u00a0 Biodigesters break down manure and other biomass to create biogas (very different in Cuba than the US) which is used for tractors or transportation.\u00a0 Vegetable and herb production in Cuba exploded from 4000 tons in 1994 to over four million tons by 2006.\u00a0 This is why Jason Hickel\u2019s \u201cSustainable Development Index<\/a>\u201d rated Cuba\u2019s ecological efficiency as the best in the world in 2019.<\/p>\n

Where Are We Headed? <\/strong><\/p>\n

The connection between LE and climate change is becoming increasingly evident.\u00a0 US media stories typically focus on a given disaster such as a flood and mention how aging infrastructure is being neglected.\u00a0 The implication is that if infrastructure were updated to its status of 50 or 100 years ago, that would be adequate.\u00a0 It would not be adequate because climate change means that storms will be more frequent, more intense and more deadly in the future.<\/p>\n

By 2017, Cuba had become the only country with a government-led plan (Project Life<\/a>, or Tarea Vida<\/em>) to combat climate change which includes a 100 year projection.\u00a0 While Cuba is looking ahead and planning how to protect people from increasingly devastating storms, US politicians feverishly bury their heads in the sand in subservience to corporate interests, subjecting future generations to ever greater catastrophes.<\/p>\n

This causes LE in the US to plunge down while LE in Cuba climbs slowly upward.\u00a0 Covid did not create the LE divide between the US and Cuba.\u00a0 Covid exacerbated trends which have become increasingly intertwined for decades.\u00a0 The best guess is that these trends will continue well into the future.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The post Life Expectancy: The US and Cuba in the Time of Covid<\/a> first appeared on Dissident Voice<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recent data shows that between 2019 and 2021, life expectancy (LE) in the US plunged almost three years while for Cuba it edged up 0.2 years.\u00a0 Yet, in 1960, the year after its revolution, Cuba had a LE of \u00a064.2 years, lower by 5.6 years than that in the US (69.8 years).\u00a0 As I document [\u2026]<\/p>\n

The post Life Expectancy: The US and Cuba in the Time of Covid<\/a> first appeared on Dissident Voice<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[304,1010,8941,1,36],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800178"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=800178"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800178\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":802244,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800178\/revisions\/802244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=800178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=800178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=800178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}