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Universal Access To Health Care In Caribbean Prolonging Life. Some Countries in Region lead U.S. in Life Expectancy rate

Posted by CaribShout on September 1, 2009 at 9:31pm
Their birthplaces may not have America’s most sophisticated health services, but people in several Caribbean countries are living just as long as Americans. As a matter of fact, in a few cases, they are actually outliving White and Black Americans. According to data compiled and released by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and the Population Reference Bureau the gaps in the life spans can be as long as two years. When the focus is narrowed to African-American males the difference can be as wide as six years. Health experts in both the Caribbean and the United States are pointing to the differences to underscore the need for the comprehensive health reform proposed by President Barack Obama and the Democrats in Congress who want to provide coverage for the estimated t 40 million people across the country who currently don’t have health insurance. Universal access to health care is a fact of life in almost every Caribbean nation and territory. For example, Martinique has a life expectancy rate of 80 years and Guadeloupe 79 years. The rates of the French West Indian territories surpassed the United States’ 77.9 years. At the same time, Cuba and Puerto Rico each had 78 years, about the same as the United States. The CDC figures showed that life expectancy in the United States rose by 73 days since 2006 when it 77.7 years. The change was attributed to a fall in mortality rates for cancer and heart disease, the nation’s two top killers. In addition, there was a 10 percent drop in deaths from the AIDS virus. It was steepest decline in a decade. The CDC data indicated a relatively wide gap between Blacks and Whites with white females in the United States living on average to 80 years and Black women reaching 77 years. However, Black males have a life span of 70.2 years, compared with 75.8 for White Americans. “Life expectancy has been increasing for a long time,” said Robert Anderson, head of CDC’s mortality statistics branch. “Aside from the occasion blip, we’re talking about increases over the last 100 years.” In the predominantly Black Caribbean countries, males in Martinique and Guadeloupe have life spans of at least five yeas longer than African-Americans. Men in Dominica, Cuba, Barbados, Antigua, Grenada, Jamaica, Guadeloupe, and Martinique and the Netherlands Antilles also tend to outlive African-American males by between one to six years. Women in Cuba, Dominica, Guadeloupe, Barbados, and the Netherlands Antilles have longer life expectancy than African-American women as well. Here then are key elements of the global picture: * Almost 50 countries, 30 of them classified as developed nations have a better life expectancy and about 19 developing lands have a better life expectancy than the U.S. * Worldwide life expectancy is 66.5 years, almost 12 years shorter than that of the United States. In the Caribbean it is 71 years; South America 73; and Central America 74. Western Europe’s 80; Sub-Sahara Africa 51; and in North Africa 69 years. * As a whole, the Caribbean’s life span of men is 69 years while for women it is 74 years. * The United States ranks 46th in the world for infant mortality with a rate of 6.7 infants dying per 100,000 live births. For Black babies in the United States the rate is almost 13 deaths, the same as Barbados and the Netherlands Antilles. Cuba’s rate of infant survival of 4.7 is better than the U.S. The Bahamas infant mortality rate of 11 deaths is slightly better than that of U.S. Blacks. In Martinique it is 8; Guadeloupe 6, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago 26 per 100,000 live births. * Singapore has the world’s lowest infant mortality rate with 2.3 infant deaths per 100,000 live births while Afghanistan 155 is last. Yvonne Graham, Brooklyn’s Deputy Borough President, said that access to health care was a “key” factor in examining life expectancy rates. In the United States, she said, a major consideration in assessing the “much of the difference between Whites and Blacks” was people’s access to affordable health care in a timely fashion,” she said. Dr. Milton Haynes, a former President of the 6,000 member New York County Medical Society, agreed. “That’s why I am supporting President Obama’s reform proposals,” he said.

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