Tag Archive for: costs

Postcolonization-2

‘Repair is recognizing what history has denied us’

Portugal needs ‘to pay the cost’ of slavery and other colonial-era crimes, the country’s president Marcelo da Sousa declared at a recent dinner with foreign journalists. ‘The country takes full responsibility for the wrongs of the past and that those crimes – including colonial massacres – had costs.’

‘Are there goods that were looted and not returned? Let’s see how we can repair this. Acknowledging the past and taking responsibility for it is more important than apologizing. Apologizing is the easy part, you turn your back and the job is done.’ 

The president’s remarks came after the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk added his voice to the African and Caribbean countries calling for reparations to be made over slavery and colonization at the UN Forum on people of African descent in April.

The head of State further defended that Portugal has the ‘obligation’ to ‘lead the ‘reparation process’ to the countries that were colonized. He noted that this process does not have to go through ‘paying compensation.’ Reparations could be made by cancelling the debts of former colonies or introducing credit lines, financial packages or special cooperation programmes.

Portugal’s new centre-right government severely disapproved the president’s suggestion of slavery reparations, declaring that ‘ there was and is no process or programme’ for paying reparations for the Portuguese colonial past. The government’s line is and will be: deepening mutual relations, respect for historical truth and intense and close cooperation, based on the reconciliation of brotherly peoples.’

The president’s comments elicited above all strong criticism from rightwing and far-right parties in Parliament. Paulo Núncio, the leader of the Christian Democrats (CDS) and junior partner in the Democratic Alliance government, said ‘his party does not need to revisit colonial legacies and reparation duties.’ André Ventura, the leader of the far-right Chega party went even further by calling the president’s behaviour ‘a betrayal of the Portuguese people.’

The minister of Racial Equality of Brazil Anielle Franco on the other hand warmly welcomed the forceful statement of the Portuguese president and called for concrete actions and payment of reparations for past mistakes.

Her declaration was fully supported by the Marielle Franco Institute and the Centre for Labor Relations and Inequalities Studies. ‘The Portuguese expansion is inseparable from slavery. The absolute absence of positioning on the part of Portugal, and the lack of concrete measures of reparation to the Brazilian black population for the profound damage caused by enslavement and transatlantic trafficking are faults that need to be remedied.’ 

Meanwhile, the Angolan historian Alberto Pinto considers it ’impossible and even absurd’ to make a calculation today of the tragic costs of history. ‘It is better to teach the history of Africa in schools. Knowledge about the history of slavery is important. Returning assets, asking for forgiveness or paying debts are things common people do not think about, that only has to do with certain political interests.’

Epsy Campbell Barr, former Costa Rica vice-president and chairwoman of the UN Forum for people of African descent, agrees that it should be mandatory to teach the history of slavery in schools, but disagrees with regard to repairs. ‘Repair is recognizing what history has denied us.’ 

Enjoy your week          Aproveite a semana      (pic Público/Sapo)

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Cesarean

Cesareans prevail in the private sector

The two largest maternity hospitals in Portugal are private. Most babies there are delivered by cesarean section.

Last year a third of all births in the Greater Lisbon area took place in 3 big private hospitals (Lusíadas, Luz, and CUF), where over half of the babies were born by cesarean section. In the 13 public health hospitals of Lisbon, the cesarean rate proved to be much lower (31%), although still higher than recommended by the World Health Organisation (10-15%).

All over the world, there is an increase in cesareans, especially in wealthier environments (highly educated women) for non-medical reasons. The fastest increase occurs in South Asia. In Europe, there are major differences in the cesarean section between member states, where rates vary from 52% in Cyprus to 25% in the UK and 17% in Sweden.

Ten years ago a commission was created in Portugal to reduce the number of cesareans in the country. Although the rate decreased initially, the country continues to rank poorly on this indicator at the international level, basically because of the dominating private sector, where cesarean rates use to be twice as high as in public hospitals.
 

Portuguese women who can choose to have a child in private hospitals are mainly women with health insurance, which allows them to pay only a small part of the cost of deliveries – which for private individuals can vary from 4000 euros for vaginal delivery to 7000 euros for a cesarean section.

Moreover, the lack of obstetricians in the public sector makes more and more women prefer to give birth in a calm private environment, where most cesareans are scheduled instead of urgent, as in busy public hospitals.

While structural decisions in the ailing National Health Service (SNS) are time after time postponed, the outflow of obstetricians to the private sector continues.

‘Just last week a doctor left the country’s largest public health hospital Santa Maria in Lisbon for the private sector exclusively for financial reasons’, complains Dr. Ayres de Campos, who leads a governmental commission to tackle problems in obstetric care.

‘In the SNS you get very poorly paid and work long hours. Everything that is complicated comes to public hospitals. For years and years, management has been chaotic, there is an absence of thinking in favor of the common good and lots of conflicts of interest’, he sighs.


Enjoy your week                   Aproveite a semana      (pic Público/Sapo)











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