Structural inequality and low spending on social protection and public health triggered the lethality of covid-19 in Latin America and made the region the epicenter of the health crisis, according to the latest Amnesty International report published this Wednesday.
“Pre-existing crises such as the lack of infrastructure and public investment, and the failure to prioritize the right to health for decades created fertile ground for covid-19 to disproportionately affect Latin America,” he explained to Eph Érika Guevara, regional director of the NGO.
The study, developed by AI and the Center for Economic and Social Rights (CESR), analyzes the investment of public spending on health and the keys to understanding why Latin America has become, with 56.4 million cases and 1, 2 million deaths, in the area most affected by the virus in the world in health and economic terms.
With only 8.4% of the world’s population, the region has suffered 28% of the world’s total deaths from covid-19, with the countries with the most inequality and the least public spending on health and social protection being the ones that suffered the most .
This is the main conclusion of the report “Unequal and lethal: five keys to recovering from the human rights crisis that unleashed the pandemic in Latin America”, which adds that “the violation of the right to health does not happen by chance, but by decisions of state authorities.
“It could have been avoided”
Mexico, Brazil and Peru, where the richest 1% of the population monopolizes more than 30% of the national wealth, have registered the highest number of deaths in the region in proportion to their population, highlights the report.
Along the same lines, Chile, where the richest 20% of the population accumulate 10 times more income than the poorest 20%, also has one of the highest per capita mortality rates in the region.
Although many Latin American countries made cash transfers during the pandemic, “none of them expanded health insurance or took sufficient steps to implement universal social security mechanisms.”
Kate Donald, acting executive director of the CESR, noted that “if Latin American countries had acted in the decades before the pandemic, the region could have avoided so much pain and loss of life.”
“Now (governments) have an opportunity to prevent the next disaster caused by inequality and to shift to a rights-based economy by proactively mobilizing resources,” he added.
More health spending
Although the Pan American Health Organization establishes that a minimum of 6% of GDP must be dedicated to health, almost all the countries in the region spend less, which means that they do not have enough hospital beds or professionals, Guevara explained.
In Peru, in the decade that preceded the pandemic, the authorities did not increase public spending on health despite years of sustained economic growth and only invested 3.3% of their GDP.
In Mexico, more than 15 million people lost access to health coverage in the two years prior to the pandemic due to bureaucratic inefficiencies in government policy.
In Chile, per capita public spending on health represents only a third of the average for OECD countries, the report indicates, and half of total spending on health care comes from the pockets of patients, added Rodrigo Bustos. , director of AI Chile.
Improve collection
AI points out that one of the main causes of low health spending is low tax collection: in 2019, the region only collected an average of 22% of its GDP in taxes, according to data from the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean ( Cepal), compared to 33% of the average in the OECD countries.
In addition, in many countries of the region the tax systems are regressive, with taxes that do not demand enough from those who can pay more, so they do not have the tools to reduce inequality and redistribute wealth.
Added to this is that the resources were not invested with the aim of addressing inequalities or historically marginalized groups, Guevara denounced.
“There was no differentiated response from the States for indigenous peoples, black communities, women and girls who live in poverty and who were therefore disproportionately affected by the pandemic,” he said.
“In general terms – he concluded – Latin America was plunged into a crisis not only of health but of human rights.” (I)
Source: Eluniverso
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