Posted on 07/15/2006 4:13:34 PM PDT by Bangupjob
Latin America: As rumors fly about Fidel Castro's demise, truths about his regime's failures slip out. His vaunted overseas "free" medical program for the poor, once a propaganda coup, is falling apart.
In Bolivia, at least 30 Cuban doctors out of 719 defected to freedom, according to Bolivian media.
In Venezuela, 4,000 Cuban doctors out of 15,000 also fled the country, Union Radio reported.
These Cuban doctors were at the forefront of Castro's last-ditch effort to rejuvenate his communist dictatorship. Castro cooked up the Venezuelan "Barrio Adentro" plan just three years ago with Hugo Chavez to obscure his record of dispatching brutal military mercenaries and guerrillas abroad to seize power and influence. ...
For Castro, his perfect plan was remarkably cheap. Although details are hardly transparent, it's known that the scheme cost Cuba only a few million dollars. Cuban medics got $100 a month and another $100 for family members back home to ensure their return.
But Cuba's doctors didn't play according to the script. Over in Caracas, some who had passports simply walked out, got on planes and sought to practice medicine in the free world. Others, whose passports were under the lock and key of their Communist Party minders, sought asylum at U.S. embassies, and got it.
Other doctors made contact with networks of Caracas' 40,000 Cuban exiles who'd fled Castro in earlier waves and quietly made their way to asylum and safety elsewhere.
It's no surprise why they did it. ...
(Excerpt) Read more at investors.com ...
I've personally not met any doctors from Cuba. But, given Castro's history with socialized medicine, I will assume they wouldn't be qualified to pass the boards.
To show the world that his regime was utopia he forced the medical schools in Cuba to graduate minimally qualified people to the rank of “Doctor”. Russia did the same thing many years ago. The title “Doctor” is subject to the dictates of those in power.
Now I have met some of the Russian doctors that have entered the state run hospitals on granting programs.
They are the worst critics of the 'motherlands' medical programs.
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How very interesting, Calpernia.
Thank you for sharing.
AR
Just wait, ..if Hillarrhea makes president, you'll see American versions of these "doctors"
The U.S. has the most stringent demands on those in the medical profession in the world. If anyone qualifies as a “Medical Doctor” in this country, than I will call them Doctor without question.
I think anyone who defects from Cuba should be required to write a one page essay about why they are doing it, just so the idiot lefties at DU and elsewhere get to see it and know Castro is a slavemaster.
But when you come in on foundation grants, the immigrants have to meet the sponsoring foundations demands, not the USA's.
They would rely more on the complaint, history/signs/symptoms and good physicals. Here, that is part of the chart, but the docs can't wait for the myriad lab results they've ordered. A Cuban doc would go orgasmic and croak if he could see what he could order here at Charity in Baton Rouge.
To pass boards here:
Maybe not, but the training advantages and options are so different.
My Dad always said that the practice of medicine is an art, not a science...and that is so true.
In that vein I'm sure some could do quite well here.
After they pass our boards!!!!
Don't be silly. No one is telling you you can't practice medicine any way you want to practice it. You can take the deferral and go to the countryside or you can pay your loans and stay in the city. It's all your choice and it's all up to you. Cuban doctors abroad have no such choices. It's the facts on the ground.
You still have no idea what I was posting to Ronnie. I can care less if you followed or not. Have a good night.
Don't be silly. If you want to be unpleasant, that is your choice. But to downplay the huge looming disaster of Castrocare and claim it's just county politics is absurd.
I didn't down play a thing. You are the one accusing me of that when I'm comparing a political propaganda move that was implemented by Clinton.
castro's doctors are a bunch of bandaid putter-onners.
If they could get access to bandaids during their training.
Tough luck about that.
Political propaganda by Clinton is nowhere near the same league as brutal leftist communism.
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