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(12/07/09 3:51am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>“Flawed but fair” is the way the April 2008 Bulletin of the World Health Organization described the Sistema Unico de Saude, Brazil’s national health system.Brazilian sentiment about Sistema Unico de Saude appears to echo that assessment – that the system isn’t perfect, but it does a decent job of providing medical services to millions of Brazilians who otherwise wouldn’t have access to health care.In fact, access to health care is seen as a human right in Brazil and was legally established as such in the Brazilian Constitution of 1988.The system itself was established in 1990, and has gradually grown to provide medical services to roughly 70 percent of Brazil’s population, according to the WHO.Unlike the Canadian single-payer system, in which government funding pays for mainly privately-run health care, Sistema Unico de Saude is a system in which the government pays for government-run medical services, much like Great Britain’s National Health Service. The system provides health care services free-of-charge to any Brazilian citizen, not just those living in poverty.In addition to Sistema Unico de Saude, there is a large private health care sector in Brazil that provides both insurance and medical services. Among Brazilians who can afford private health care services, some utilize these private services exclusively, while others continue to use public services to varying degrees.According to the Centro Brasileiro de Estudos de Saude, or the Brazilian Center for Health Studies, public expenditures comprise only 45 percent of annual total health care spending in Brazil, with private expenditures making up the other 55 percent. This figure is comparable to that of the United States, in which expenditures of public funds account for about 46 percent of total annual health care spending, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.Sistema Unico de Saude operates relatively efficiently, spending an estimated $158 per Brazilian per year, according to the WHO. In fact, many experts argue that the Brazilian government spends too little on health care. Overall spending on health care in Brazil, including private-sector expenditures, is about $765 per capita and represents 7.5 percent of Brazil’s GDP, according to the WHO. In comparison, expenditure on health care in the United States is approximately $7,421 per capita, representing 16.2 percent of the United States’ GDP, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.Though Brazilian health statistics are not as good as those of the U.S. (for example, the infant mortality rate in Brazil per 1,000 births is 22.58, while in the U.S. it is 6.26, according to the CIA World Factbook), it still seems that Brazilians get much more bang for their health care buck than we do.To be sure, there are several aspects of Sistema Unico de Saude that the United States would do well to imitate in its current health care overhaul, such as an emphasis on primary and preventive care.At the very least, some of the successes that Sistema Unico de Saude has experienced, such as offering free vaccinations and excellent HIV and AIDS treatment and prevention, serve as examples of progress we’ve yet to make in our own health care system and help debunk the myth that the United States’ health care system is the best in the world.Earlier this semester, for example, multiple family members in the U.S. expressed their concern about me being able to acquire Tamiflu in Brazil should I contract the H1N1 flu, as I have asthma. Yet, while I heard stories of people in the United States not purchasing Tamiflu because of its price, here in Brazil, not only is Tamiflu available but it is given out free to anyone who has a confirmed case of H1N1.Thus, while the United States’ health care system performs quite well in many different ways, it still has a good deal to learn from other systems. It could certainly take some pointers about equality of access from Brazil’s system.
(11/10/09 5:25am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>SAO PAULO, Brazil - Brazilians are no strangers to economic inequality.The poorest 40 percent of Brazilians receives 10 percent of the annual national revenue, and the richest 10 percent receives 40 percent, according to the Brazilian Institute of Applied Economic Research.There are many proposed solutions to the extreme inequality existent in Brazil, but perhaps one of the most well known and controversial is land reform.According to an article published in the Brazilian Revista Economica do Nordeste, or Northeast Economic Review, in the observation period of 1995 to 1996, the smallest 50 percent of Brazilian farms, in terms of physical size, had about 2 percent of Brazilian farmland. The largest 5 percent had about 68 percent. Thus, the inequality of land distribution is even higher than that of revenue distribution in Brazil and signals a potential area in which efforts can be made to eliminate the latter. Indeed, the unequal distribution of land has been an issue throughout Brazil’s history, one that the Brazilian Constitution of 1988 sought to eliminate through various measures, such as giving the government the right to take over unproductive lands on large farms and granting landless individuals ownership of land tracts of less than 50 hectares under certain conditions. Even before the Brazilian Constitution dealt with the matter, in 1984 the Landless Workers’ Movement (Movimento Sem Terra) formed with the goal of speeding agrarian reform.From shortly after its formation in the 1980s until today, the most publicly visible aspect of the Landless Workers’ Movement has been its many occupations of particular pieces of unproductive land to try to receive ownership rights to that land.Right outside of the city of Sao Paulo, for example, in 2002, about 450 landless workers commenced an occupation of a state-owned piece of land that was soon to become a landfill in order to gain rights to the land. That parcel of land, now known as Irma Alberta (Sister Alberta) by supporters of the Movement, has come to be classified as an established “settlement” as opposed to a less-developed “encampment;” that is, Irma Alberta, which now boasts several houses, a school and plots of plants such as manioc, corn and coffee, has become the permanent (or so they hope) home of 118 members of the Landless Workers’ Movement. The movement sponsors many social programs and organizations and emphasizes the importance of empowering and valuing its members as well as taking care of the environment and producing quality organic food. Each Landless Workers’ settlement functions as an intentional community, with necessary tasks divided up among members. However, although the movement presents positive opportunities for many landless, unemployed and homeless workers, it continues to be heavily criticized among Brazilians because of its invasion of private lands and the occasional escalation of conflicts to violence (often between movement members and property owners or movement members and the police).Regardless of the many possible criticisms of the occupations, the accomplishments of settlements such as Sister Alberta are perhaps a real-life example of Nobel Laureate Elinor Ostrom’s findings. Perhaps they are an example of a way that social solidarity and shared interests can allow people to make a collective effort at the local level to eliminate poverty and, on a larger scale, to eliminate inequality.
(10/27/09 4:16am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>SAO PAULO, Brazil - There are several things, it seems, that a majority of the Brazilians I have met all possess: a television, a pair of Havaianas (a particular brand of flip-flops) and, when it comes to adolescent Brazilians, an Orkut account. None of this really seemed that surprising or different to me, perhaps because United States citizens also seem to like television (with a few differences from Brazilians in programming preferences), flip-flops (though they may be Old Navy brand and not Havaianas) and social networking sites (even if they are Facebook or MySpace, and not Orkut).However, there is one thing that most of the Brazilians I have met all seem to have that I found somewhat shocking and quite different from, at least, my U.S. experience: a robbery story. I suppose that given the high degree of economic inequality in Brazil, the attention the favelas of Brazil have attracted and the warnings those of us traveling to South America received during our IU study-abroad orientation about the likelihood of one of us getting stolen from while here, I shouldn’t have been that surprised by the number of times Brazilian friends have casually mentioned having been robbed.Indeed, I’ve heard robbery stories of all kinds – stories about attempted robberies (most successful, some not) taking place on buses, personal cars or on the street; stories about attempted robberies with one unarmed robber, one armed robber or multiple armed robbers; and stories about attempted robberies that have taken place in houses, in relatively deserted downtown streets or in bustling residential areas. Yet, the stories I hear continue to shock me.Perhaps, though, it’s neither the content nor the ubiquity of the stories that I find most surprising, but the casual tone with which they are often told. Obviously, no one feels neutral about being robbed, and obviously many Brazilians are afraid of being robbed. At the same time, though, the high rate of robbery in many areas of the country seems to have made robbery seem like something much more common than it is considered in the United States. When a couple of friends and I were robbed at the entrance of a restaurant in Salvador, Bahia, earlier this year we went immediately to the nearest police station to report the robbery. The men working at the station were generally friendly, but they didn’t seem surprised, apologetic or sympathetic about the situation. Regardless of the casual tone with which people talk of robberies, however, I’ve never ceased to get the impression that being robbed is one common experience Brazilians would rather not share.
(10/13/09 10:15pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>SAO PAULO, Brazil – As someone born and raised in Indiana, Chicago was the city I was initially rooting for. It was where I saw a van Gogh painting for the first time; it was where the best concert I have ever attended took place (the Decemberists playing with the Grant Park Orchestra in the summer 2007); it was where I completed the tedious process of obtaining my student visa before coming to Brazil. Obviously, my connection to Chicago might not be as strong as that of a native Chicagoan, but all of the above experiences, among others, have made me feel a certain affinity for the Windy City – which is why the Oct. 2 announcement of Rio de Janeiro as the host of the 2016 Summer Olympic Games was upsetting, to a certain extent. Not only do I feel a personal connection with Chicago, but also the idea of being able to drive merely three hours from my hometown (which, to be fair, I will most likely be living far away from in 2016) to attend the Olympic Games was appealing. The likelihood of me being able to travel to Rio to see the 2016 Games seemed even more remote than the likelihood of me being able to cough up the dough for a ticket to the games in the first place. And then there’s the question of morale. I was excited at the prospect of what a winning bid might mean for my fellow Midwesterners – though I knew some Chicagoans were critical of the bid, my impression was that a majority were supportive of it. But I was conflicted. While a part of me wanted Chicago to win the bid, I was also sympathetic to the desires of the Brazilians surrounding me. For yes, the city of Rio de Janeiro was making the bid, but just as citizens of the United States united around Chicago’s bid as a national project, Brazilians everywhere were extremely emotionally involved in the outcome of Rio de Janeiro’s bid. Brazil President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, for example, was so overjoyed at Rio winning the 2016 bid that he cried. President da Silva traveled to Copenhagen to help make the case for Rio’s bid, as President Obama did for Chicago. Furthermore, I was understanding of the fact that the Olympics have never been on the South American continent, and the rectification of this inequality was well past due. And then I learned that Rio de Janeiro’s Olympic bid also most likely made the most economic sense out of the four finalists, according to a New York Times article.I’ve come to feel that the International Olympic Committee made the right choice Oct. 2.
(09/29/09 4:28am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>SAO PAULO, BRAZIL - Let’s begin today with a short vocabulary lesson. Here’s how it will work: I’ll list a word, and you ponder for a couple of seconds what you think that word might mean. Then, read on to see if your definition of the word is correct. Easy, right? OK, first word: box. This one may appear simple, but looks can be deceiving – take the time to really explore what you think “box” might mean. All right, ready to find out the definition? A “box” is a shower.Too tricky? All right, let’s try another word: outdoor. What might the word “outdoor” mean? Have you formulated some thoughts? Well, let’s compare those to the definition I’ve been using as of late – an “outdoor” is a billboard.Those students who are Indiana natives might find this lesson reminiscent of the ISTEP+ memory test we were coerced into taking in elementary school. The objective of the test was to match simple words, such as “ball” and “tiger,” with their respective made-up nonsense counterparts, which were “lep” and “korf,” without looking back at the sheet that told us which nonsense words matched particular arbitrary definitions. Indeed, for most – if not all – of the readers of this column, the above definitions of “box” and “outdoor” likely seem as arbitrary and nonsensical as the ISTEP+ inventions. However, to any Brazilian Lusophone who might be reading this, the above definitions of “box” and “outdoor” make complete sense.That is because Brazilian Portuguese, like so many other languages in the world, has assimilated English words and phrases into its own vocabulary. Many of these words and phrases, like “e-mail,” “Internet” and “fast food,” have the same meaning in Brazilian Portuguese as they do in American English. As we’ve already seen, however, several other English words and phrases have taken on different meanings in Brazil.Take the word “cheeseburger,” for example. About a month ago, I sat down at a diner sort of restaurant here in São Paulo and ordered a “cheese salada.” The “cheese” was short for “cheeseburger,” and “salada” means with lettuce and tomato and the like. Thus, I was dismayed when I received a cheese-less hamburger five minutes later. “Sorry,” I said to the man at the counter. “But I think you got my order wrong. I ordered a cheese salada.”“Oh, but that is a cheese salada,” he responded.“So a cheese salada doesn’t come with cheese?” I asked.“No, it doesn’t, sorry,” he said. In addition, whereas some English words take on new meanings in Brazilian Portuguese, other words retain their original meaning in Brazil while losing that meaning or falling out of use in the United States. The most commonly used phrase for “flash drive” in Brazil, for instance, is “pen drive.” While “pen drive” continues to be used in American English, it has been largely replaced by the aforementioned “flash drive” in the United States. While the proliferation of English in Brazilian Portuguese is a poignant reminder of the strength of globalization, the particular manner in which Brazilian Portuguese has assimilated English vocabulary shows us that perhaps globalization won’t eventually result in the worldwide monolithic mono-culture we might fear. Elements of culture, like vocabulary, as well as computer technology, music and fashion, all take on new and different meanings in different cultural contexts. Thus, just like people, their characteristics vary from place to place, and they are continually evolving.
(09/17/09 4:25am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Last Friday, the bicycle-enthusiast and activist group Bicicletada took to the streets of Sao Paulo in order to spread awareness and support of bicycle use in the city, or as Bicicletada participant Paulo Jabardo put it, “To show that we are traffic, too.” Participants in Friday’s demonstration began riding up to the Praca do Ciclista, or Bicyclist Plaza, more than two hours before the event officially began, to socialize and pass around flyers with information such as traffic laws regarding motorists’ driving near bicycles.Bicicletada is not just about the demonstration itself, said one rider. Bicicletada events also serve as a place to “converse and exchange ideas.” At 9 p.m., a group of about 30 cyclists pedaled out of the Praca do Ciclista and rode onto Avenida Paulista, one of Sao Paulo’s most well-known and well-traveled streets, to begin the official demonstration. Bicicletada will have a demonstration on Sept. 22, in celebration of World Carfree Day. Cyclists at Friday’s event believed this increased number of demonstrations in September most likely caused Bicicletada participation to be more spread out, resulting in Friday’s low attendance. The cyclists, however, had high hopes for attendance at the Sept. 22 demonstration, as hundreds of cyclists attended last year’s World Carfree Day ride put on by Bicicletada in Sao Paulo. The Bicicletada Web site estimates that 500 riders participated in the 2008 World Carfree Day ride.The route of each Bicicletada demonstration is never pre-determined, though all rides begin at the Praca do Ciclista. According to Bicicletada participant Afonso Savaglia, the purpose of the Friday night rides is to show the people of Sao Paulo that there exists support for bicycle use in the city and to garner respect for cyclists and the rules that motorists should follow while driving near them. The name Bicicletada is roughly translated as “full of bicycles.” It is meant to be a Portuguese rendition of “Critical Mass,” the English name of the now-worldwide bicycle support and awareness movement that started in San Francisco and served as inspiration for the establishment of Bicicletada. When asked about their reasons for utilizing or supporting bicycle transport in Sao Paulo, Bicicletada participants mentioned wanting to help the environment and having a desire to improve their health through riding. Moreover, according to many cyclists at the demonstration on Friday, biking is an efficient way to get around the city. When compared to driving a car, biking is faster and allows for more freedom. They advised that people need to “Rethink urban mobility ... the car isn’t everything.”