Leaked Cables, Cuban Healthcare System

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
161

yes, you make a good point…

but as i stated earlier, you are in over your head on this one. not only do i have insight into this issue being of Cuban heritage and knowing hundreds of Cubans(not just one as you state) but i am also a health care professional and have added insight to what bullshit health care stats can be.

example. one of the smaller facilities that feeds us a lot of patients is considered by JACO to be one of the top 100 hospitals in the country based on several statistical categories.

of which many are very skewed if you did not have the insight to read behind the numbers. this hospital does not have many specialty services that we have, being we are a regional trauma center, like 24 hour orthopedic, intensivist, interventional cardiology, acute nephrology, neurosurgery, ect…

so what that means, is that they send their sickest most acute patients to us. so of course our mortality, co morbidity, and rates of in hospital complications are much higher than theirs, they send their worst cases to us!!!

on paper, you think if you did not know better, that if you were in trouble health wise that is the place you would want to go, but in reality, unless you have anything more serious than a severe bout of constipation, you better take an extra 30 minutes and come to my hospital.

that is not much of an exaggeration, I have worked both hospitals, and many of the patients that qualify for intensive care unit care there, would probably not even warrant step-down unit care at where I work now. hell, some of that places ICU patients probably would have been put on the general med-surgical floor.

really.

point is, if it were not for cherry picked and or cooked up stats, that hospital would not be rated as high as it is.

I can go on more…I have a ton of more examples I can share…I love the discussion…

like I said though…

NOBODY is ever wrong on the internet…thus I do not expect to change your mind.

162

That’s some good insight heavythrower, but instead of assuming the stats/facts are incorrect(some from CIA factbook), wouldn’t it be better to disprove them rather than jumping to the conclusion that they’re wrong?

164

[quote]Chushin wrote:

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:
That’s some good insight heavythrower, but instead of assuming the stats/facts are incorrect(some from CIA factbook), wouldn’t it be better to disprove them rather than jumping to the conclusion that they’re wrong?[/quote]

How would you suggest he do that, other than to share his perspective based on his 100s of informants and his expertise in health care?[/quote]

Not a single person here has even addressed any one of the sources he provided, all they’ve said is they’ve heard otherwise. When was heavythrower last there? recently? one year? five years? more? Did he go to every hospital and clinic?
Don’t address stats and facts with personal experiences, find meritorious data to the contrary.
Last I checked, a single persons experiences don’t reflect everyones.

165

to heavythrower.

you are right, you cant change my mind on this and I have the feeling that I cant change yours.
Also I feel I have made all arguments that I have about judging a entity on a macro level and also
the original discussion I started about good argumentation. So I will leave it here.

take care.

166

[quote]kilpaba wrote:
His point is simply ATTACK THE ARGUMENT and NOT THE PERSON. If the stats are bullshit, it is incumbent on you to show HOW they are bullshit. Simply waving your hands and saying “I don’t think that is true from my experience so it isn’t” is not a good argument. Your world view is by definition extremely limited.

Experience does matter, no one is claiming it doesn’t, but if we are talking about macro-scale things it becomes much less relevant. There is also the fact that people are often just plain out and out wrong in their perceptions and interpretations of things. This is why we have objective data in the first place.

The only example I can think of off hand is that people are often extremely bad at knowing what will make them happy (according to the “Science of Happiness”). They think if they just get more money, for example, that they will then be happier, but once basic needs are met this has been shown to be false. Lottery winners revert back to the same baseline happiness score after the initial euphoric wave dissipates. So why are most people still chasing money? Doesn’t our perception of things dictate what is true? Not always it would appear.

Once again for the record, I am a Libertarian who does in fact think the Cuban Health Care system is not as good as people would make out. I am just saying we need to actually debate if we are going to learn anything. No one said it was supposed to be easy. [/quote]

x2

this sums it up nicely.

167

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:
That’s some good insight heavythrower, but instead of assuming the stats/facts are incorrect(some from CIA factbook), wouldn’t it be better to disprove them rather than jumping to the conclusion that they’re wrong?[/quote]

  1. We know how accurate the CIA always is.

  2. We know that Cuba will accurately self report health care statistics.

The statistics are about as factual as the 99% of the vote Fidel Castro receives. Only a fool would believe it is true. Debating them is an utter waste of time and accurate statistics do not exist.

168

I don’t think the CIA has any reason to inflate Cuba’s numbers.

169

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:
I don’t think the CIA has any reason to inflate Cuba’s numbers.[/quote]

They don’t. They review Cuba’s self reported numbers and then guess from there. It is pure fiction.

170

[quote]MaximusB wrote:THIS is what I was trying to get through to Ryan.

Ryan, I think you rely too much on stats, on not enough on real world experiences. Can both be skewed? Yes. Can both be biased? Of course. But with real world experience, YOU are able to gauge the caliber of person you are dealing with. With a study, it is almost always funded by a special interest group who will most likely NOT call it straight.

Ryan, you need some street smarts my man.[/quote]

You only think I rely too much on statistics because you don’t like what they say. If I didn’t rely on statistics, you’d still say I was wrong and would claim I have no evidence. Don’t even attempt to deny this.

Why is it so hard for you to admit what every independent observer reports: that the Cuban have done an excellent job with their limited resources in the field of health care? That’s all I’m asking, and it’s incredibly revealing of how fragile the right-winger’s psyche is that they can’t even admit this much of the truth.

Now, like it or not, no one’s experience can furnish them with the slightest hint about average outcomes or the overall efficiency of a system. This is a fact, and you have done nothing to damage it or even address it. It is a fatal flaw in your argument, yet you press on like it doesn’t exist.

171

[quote]heavythrower wrote:yeesh…I am done with you kid. haha…

stats and data can be unrepresentative too.[/quote]

Sure they can, but we don’t just assume that they are to avoid deflating the Conservative Reality Buffer. Since you are making the accusation (implicitly, but an accusation nonetheless), it is incumbent upon you to show that the stats are indeed false.

If you suspect they are false, then you must suspect it for some reason (unless I’m totally misreading you, and you’re simply a butthurt conservative who is upset that someone is imposing reality on your naive world view; /sarcasm). It should then not be too much of a problem for you to explain what this reason is, and then verify your hypothesis.

To do so, you must explain why the CIA is assisting the Castros in their deception.

And you least of all. Your objections might come across as less pathetic if you had even a shred of evidence to support you in your temper tantrum.

172

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:
I don’t think the CIA has any reason to inflate Cuba’s numbers.[/quote]

Now you are simply being childish and naive by bringing logic into this. The point is to condemn anything that reeks of socialism, not actually find out what’s true.

173

[quote]Ryan P. McCarter wrote:

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:
I don’t think the CIA has any reason to inflate Cuba’s numbers.[/quote]

Now you are simply being childish and naive by bringing logic into this. The point is to condemn anything that reeks of socialism, not actually find out what’s true.
[/quote]

No, he simply misunderstands where the numbers come from. You, on the other hand, are an idiot.

174

[quote]Ryan P. McCarter wrote:

[quote]MaximusB wrote:THIS is what I was trying to get through to Ryan.

Ryan, I think you rely too much on stats, on not enough on real world experiences. Can both be skewed? Yes. Can both be biased? Of course. But with real world experience, YOU are able to gauge the caliber of person you are dealing with. With a study, it is almost always funded by a special interest group who will most likely NOT call it straight.

Ryan, you need some street smarts my man.[/quote]

You only think I rely too much on statistics because you don’t like what they say. If I didn’t rely on statistics, you’d still say I was wrong and would claim I have no evidence. Don’t even attempt to deny this.

Why is it so hard for you to admit what every independent observer reports: that the Cuban have done an excellent job with their limited resources in the field of health care? That’s all I’m asking, and it’s incredibly revealing of how fragile the right-winger’s psyche is that they can’t even admit this much of the truth.

Now, like it or not, no one’s experience can furnish them with the slightest hint about average outcomes or the overall efficiency of a system. This is a fact, and you have done nothing to damage it or even address it. It is a fatal flaw in your argument, yet you press on like it doesn’t exist.
[/quote]

Ryan, listen to me my boy. You rely ONLY on statistics, I am asking you to ALSO consider the feedback of those who have DIRECTLY dealt with the system themselves. You have to be able to absorb ALL of it and come to your own conclusion.

Stats are MUCH too easily skewed, and with talking to people who have been there, at least I can judge the quality of their character to assert how valid their information is. I know alot of Cubans, and I mean ALOT of Cubans who lived in Cuba, and I cannot think of one who had a positive note about the health care system there.

You continually use the argument of “with the resources they have,” but compared to what? Where I am from, Italy was ranked #3 by the WHO for their health care system, yet my father had to wait over a year for cancer surgery. Can you now see how stats can be manipulated, and “using the resources that they have” can be very blurry? Here you have stats that say one thing, yet real world experience that contradicts it. At the end of it all, he died. ← that is the only statistic that counts Ryan.

When you see your loved one dying in a hospital bed, all your journals, reports, and studies don’t mean shit.

I am telling you my story to make my point, not everything is as it seems, you need the street smarts to filter out the bullshit and see the real world for what it really is. Ryan, you need less “bookworm” in you, and more “walking tall.”

175

[quote]Big Banana wrote:

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:
I don’t think the CIA has any reason to inflate Cuba’s numbers.[/quote]

They don’t. They review Cuba’s self reported numbers and then guess from there. It is pure fiction.[/quote]

You know this for certain? how?

176

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:

[quote]Big Banana wrote:

[quote]MattyG35 wrote:
I don’t think the CIA has any reason to inflate Cuba’s numbers.[/quote]

They don’t. They review Cuba’s self reported numbers and then guess from there. It is pure fiction.[/quote]

You know this for certain? how?[/quote]

No–his accusation is difficult to believe as it is, since the statistics are very similar no matter where you look for them, but the World Health Organization, at the very least, uses a variety of surveys and other techniques to gather their data, and does not rely on the reporting of member countries.

He’s simply a pathetic man who can’t bear to look reality in the face, and lashes out at the ones who damage his CRB.

177

[quote]Ryan P. McCarter wrote:

[quote]heavythrower wrote:yeesh…I am done with you kid. haha…

stats and data can be unrepresentative too.[/quote]

Sure they can, but we don’t just assume that they are to avoid deflating the Conservative Reality Buffer. Since you are making the accusation (implicitly, but an accusation nonetheless), it is incumbent upon you to show that the stats are indeed false.

If you suspect they are false, then you must suspect it for some reason (unless I’m totally misreading you, and you’re simply a butthurt conservative who is upset that someone is imposing reality on your naive world view; /sarcasm). It should then not be too much of a problem for you to explain what this reason is, and then verify your hypothesis.

To do so, you must explain why the CIA is assisting the Castros in their deception.

And you least of all. Your objections might come across as less pathetic if you had even a shred of evidence to support you in your temper tantrum.

[/quote]

you still here kid? figured you would have gotten tired of being an all knowing interweb smart ass/tough guy and left this argument to go rifle through your moms purse looking for weed-money.

I know too much about how it is in Cuba from my family and close family friends to care what a bunch of college kids THINK they know about life in Cuba. I will take the info from people who have actually lived there over the stats that you guys troll up on the net.

one thing is certain though…if you were actually in my presence… instead of safe behind a keyboard…

though I do not doubt you would still try to intelligently support your argument…

terms like “moron” and “pathetic” etc. would NOT be hurled in my direction by you.

haha…one thing I do not think anybody from my generation will ever get used to is how brave internet message boards can make one.

good day, the last word is yours.

180

Concerning statistics; I found this over at Good Math, Bad Math.

http://scienceblogs.com/goodmath/2006/06/skewing_statistics_for_politic.php

[i]Skewing Statistics for Politics
Category: bad math * statistics
Posted on: June 28, 2006 10:43 AM, by Mark C. Chu-Carroll

As I’ve frequently said, statistics is an area which is poorly understood by most people, and as a result, it’s an area which is commonly used to mislead people. The thing is, when you’re working with statistics, it’s easy to find a way of presenting some value computed from the data that will appear to support a predetermined conclusion - regardless of whether the data as a whole supports that conclusion. Politicians and political writers are some of the worst offenders at this.[/i]