Cuba’s Health Politics: At Home and Abroad

The original version of this piece, which has since been further adapted by COHA was published in Morbid Symptoms: Health Under Capitalism: Socialist Register 2010. Health Under Capitalism, edited by Leo Panitch and Colin Leys (London:  Merlin Press, 2009): 216-239.  A modified chapter of this work, by COHA Senior Research Fellow Dr. Julie Feinsilver, can be found on Council on Hemispheric Affairs’ website.

Cuba’s Health Politics At Home, and Elsewhere

Julie Feinsilver, Ph.D Senior Research Fellow, Council on Hemispheric Affairs

Over the past fifty years Cuba has constructed a health care system lauded by international experts and the envy of and model for developing countries – and, in certain instances, developed countries as well.  Despite considerable economic hardships, Cuba provides free universal coverage for its own population, and has achieved country health indices comparable to developed countries, but at a dramatically lower cost. In addition, Cuba is a global leader in providing medical aid and education to other countries through its ‘medical diplomacy’ program of South-South collaboration. From its initial days soon after coming to power, to the immediate medical aid it extended to Haiti after the January 12 earthquake struck Port-au-Prince with devastating results, Cuba’s revolutionary government evinced a strong ideological commitment to help other nations in an effort to repay a debt for the external support it received during the revolution. As a result, the provision of medical aid – the basis for the island highly successful medical diplomacy – to other developing countries has been a key element of Cuba’s international relations ever since the revolution.

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This analysis was prepared by COHA Senior Research Fellow Julie Feinsilver