4 ms·

Are you talking about Cuba or Venezuela (what other counties are associated with CIA conspiracy theories, sanctioned by the US, and praised for their health car

Are you talking about Cuba or Venezuela (what other counties are associated with CIA conspiracy theories, sanctioned by the US, and praised for their health care)? If so, those are both terrible dictatorships which their own populations are working hard to take down.

GordonS 5y ago
I don't want to take the discussion too OT, but I'm curious: out of all the possible countries that the OP could mean (and there are a lot), which would you think of Cuba and Venezuela specifically?
- diordiderot 5y ago
  Because he's a right wing troll that dang has gotten onto before
- coolsunglasses 5y ago
  There are not many countries with free-at-point-of-service healthcare. In most cases it's heavily subsidized but still costs money (Japan) or they have a heavily regulated private + public insurance regime (Germany). China's a good example of de jure vs. de facto differences between what is purportedly offered as opposed to what is actually accessible to Chinese citizens.
  - pokot0 5y ago
    Oh god... most euro countries have free or virtually free healthcare. Heavy regulated does not mean it's not free healthcare. It's also very easily accessible (although the level of service might be questionable at times especially for non life threatening issues).
    - jacquesm 5y ago
      And right next door: Canada.
- jessaustin 5y ago
  Because they have happy, contented (if poor) populations who enjoy better health than Americans, despite the fact that they can't import internationally available health supplies due to crippling sanctions? One suspects that someone feels a little weird about that...
- space_fountain 5y ago
  I think because they're the most extreme example of what you could plausibly be talking about, and I do actually in my personal life see leftists who defend them. Like most things there are layers of complication. I think a lot of people would admit that say France, Germany, the UK all seem to have better healthcare systems than the US (though not without their flaws). Moving down a bit maybe Iran and China do too and plausibly that might be what you meant, but I'd wager most countries you might be talking about have worse 50th percentile and maybe even 95th percentile outcomes than the US.
  - arcticbull 5y ago
    All else aside, Cuba actually has a pretty decent healthcare system - in a some ways on par with the US, in some ways better, according to the 2000 WHO survey. [1] Outcomes in the US are pretty bi-modal, for those who can afford care and those who cannot. This pulls down the country in most rankings, often quite significantly, as many studies weigh access to care in addition to quality for those who can get it. In some ways the system is just objectively bad - it's among the worst for maternal mortality rate in the OECD. [2] I do believe it's improved a bit since then, as that article came out in 2017. Life expectancy is dropping, and costs are rising. Generally cancer outcomes are regarded as a bright spot for US healthcare but a lot of that is attributable to early detection leading to rosy 5 year survival rates - without commensurate drops in its mortality. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Health_Organization_ranking_of_health_systems_in_2000 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Health_Organization_rank... [2] https://www.npr.org/2017/05/12/528098789/u-s-has-the-worst-rate-of-maternal-deaths-in-the-developed-world https://www.npr.org/2017/05/12/528098789/u-s-has-the-worst-r...
    - space_fountain 5y ago
      Thanks for throwing that out, because I feel like this is something I sort of knew, but also somehow always slips out of my mind. Maybe some motivated thinking going on? I do think, and maybe this is part of what you mean, but part of the good performance by say Cuba has nothing to do with say access to innovative cancer treatments, but just like cheap, easy medication and frankly nutrition. I also think I have an impression, and maybe this is motivated thinking again, but that some of the trade off some countries have made is between these sorts of expensive, low impact interventions, vs cheap high impact interventions. Which seems like probably the right tradeoff as a country, but isn't the straight forward better across the board story that I think gets told sometimes
- google234123 5y ago
  How many counties are sanctioned and are championed by some for their health care? OP also mentioned the CIA.
dang 5y ago
Please don't take HN threads further into political flamewar. It destroys what HN is supposed to be for, so we're trying to avoid that here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

GordonS 5y ago

I don't want to take the discussion too OT, but I'm curious: out of all the possible countries that the OP could mean (and there are a lot), which would you think of Cuba and Venezuela specifically?

diordiderot 5y ago
Because he's a right wing troll that dang has gotten onto before
coolsunglasses 5y ago
There are not many countries with free-at-point-of-service healthcare. In most cases it's heavily subsidized but still costs money (Japan) or they have a heavily regulated private + public insurance regime (Germany). China's a good example of de jure vs. de facto differences between what is purportedly offered as opposed to what is actually accessible to Chinese citizens.
- pokot0 5y ago
  Oh god... most euro countries have free or virtually free healthcare. Heavy regulated does not mean it's not free healthcare. It's also very easily accessible (although the level of service might be questionable at times especially for non life threatening issues).
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    And right next door: Canada.
jessaustin 5y ago
Because they have happy, contented (if poor) populations who enjoy better health than Americans, despite the fact that they can't import internationally available health supplies due to crippling sanctions? One suspects that someone feels a little weird about that...
space_fountain 5y ago
I think because they're the most extreme example of what you could plausibly be talking about, and I do actually in my personal life see leftists who defend them. Like most things there are layers of complication. I think a lot of people would admit that say France, Germany, the UK all seem to have better healthcare systems than the US (though not without their flaws). Moving down a bit maybe Iran and China do too and plausibly that might be what you meant, but I'd wager most countries you might be talking about have worse 50th percentile and maybe even 95th percentile outcomes than the US.
- arcticbull 5y ago
  All else aside, Cuba actually has a pretty decent healthcare system - in a some ways on par with the US, in some ways better, according to the 2000 WHO survey. [1] Outcomes in the US are pretty bi-modal, for those who can afford care and those who cannot. This pulls down the country in most rankings, often quite significantly, as many studies weigh access to care in addition to quality for those who can get it. In some ways the system is just objectively bad - it's among the worst for maternal mortality rate in the OECD. [2] I do believe it's improved a bit since then, as that article came out in 2017. Life expectancy is dropping, and costs are rising. Generally cancer outcomes are regarded as a bright spot for US healthcare but a lot of that is attributable to early detection leading to rosy 5 year survival rates - without commensurate drops in its mortality. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Health_Organization_ranking_of_health_systems_in_2000 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Health_Organization_rank... [2] https://www.npr.org/2017/05/12/528098789/u-s-has-the-worst-rate-of-maternal-deaths-in-the-developed-world https://www.npr.org/2017/05/12/528098789/u-s-has-the-worst-r...
  - space_fountain 5y ago
    Thanks for throwing that out, because I feel like this is something I sort of knew, but also somehow always slips out of my mind. Maybe some motivated thinking going on? I do think, and maybe this is part of what you mean, but part of the good performance by say Cuba has nothing to do with say access to innovative cancer treatments, but just like cheap, easy medication and frankly nutrition. I also think I have an impression, and maybe this is motivated thinking again, but that some of the trade off some countries have made is between these sorts of expensive, low impact interventions, vs cheap high impact interventions. Which seems like probably the right tradeoff as a country, but isn't the straight forward better across the board story that I think gets told sometimes
google234123 5y ago
How many counties are sanctioned and are championed by some for their health care? OP also mentioned the CIA.

dang 5y ago

Please don't take HN threads further into political flamewar. It destroys what HN is supposed to be for, so we're trying to avoid that here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html