Washington, DC.    On Tuesday, February 3, 2015, Congressman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) reintroduced HR 676, his single payer Improved Medicare for All  legislation, in the current 114th session of Congress.  The bill was introduced with 44 co-sponsors in addition to Conyers. 

Calls to congressional offices by supporters of single payer healthcare have already increased the number of co-sponsors to 46.

“Under H.R. 676, every resident of the United States would receive a card at birth that would guarantee access to a full range of medically-necessary services that include primary care, dental, prescription drugs, mental health and long term care,” said Conyers.  The bill assures to all patients free choice of physician or health care provider.

Kay Tillow, coordinator of the All Unions Committee for Single Payer Healthcare HR 676, urged everyone to call their congressperson or email them asking that they sign on as a co-sponsor of HR 676.

You can call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask for your representative by name. If you cannot speak to the representative, leave a message and request a response.

You can look up representatives by zip code here:  http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/ 

A complete list of co-sponsors of HR 676 can be found here. https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/676/cosponsors?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22HR+676%22%5D%7D  

The Physicians for a National Health Program news release is here.

Doctors group hails reintroduction of Medicare-for-all bill

Single-payer health program would cover all 42 million uninsured, upgrade everyone’s benefits and save $400 billion annually on bureaucracy, physicians say

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, February 4, 2015

Contact:
Mark Almberg, PNHP communications director, mark@pnhp.org

A national physicians group today hailed the reintroduction of a federal bill that would upgrade the Medicare program and swiftly expand it to cover the entire population.

The “Expanded and Improved Medicare for All Act,” H.R. 676, introduced last night by Rep. John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., with 44 other House members, would replace today’s welter of private health insurance companies with a single, streamlined public agency that would pay all medical claims, much like Medicare works for seniors today. The full text of the bill is available here.

Proponents say a Medicare-for-all system, also known as a single-payer system, would vastly simplify how the nation pays for care, improve patient health, restore free choice of physician, eliminate copays and deductibles, and yield substantial savings for individuals, families and the national economy.

“The global evidence is very clear: single-payer financing systems are the most equitable and cost-effective way to assure that everyone, without exception, gets high-quality care,” said Dr. Robert Zarr, president of Physicians for a National Health Program, a nonprofit research and educational group of 19,000 doctors nationwide.

“Medicare is a good model to build on, and what better way to observe Medicare’s 50th anniversary year than to improve and extend the program and its benefits to people of all ages?”

Zarr, a Washington, D.C.-based pediatrician, continued: “An expanded and improved Medicare-for-All program would assure truly universal coverage, cover all necessary services, and knock down the growing financial barriers to care – high premiums, co-pays, deductibles and coinsurance – that our nation’s patients and their families are increasingly running up against, often with calamitous results.

“Such a plan would save over $400 billion a year currently wasted on private-insurance-related bureaucracy, paperwork and marketing. That’s enough money to provide first-dollar coverage for everyone in the country – without increasing U.S. health spending by a single penny.

“Such a program would also have the financial clout to negotiate with drug and medical equipment suppliers for lower prices, and would further save money through lump-sum budgeting for hospitals.

“In short,” Zarr said, “the enactment of Rep. Conyers’ bill would take us much further down the road to a humane, just and sustainable health care system than the 2010 health law, which, despite its modest benefits, will not be able to control costs and will still leave 31 million people uninsured in 2024, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Millions more will be inadequately insured, with skimpy coverage.”

Zarr pointed out that the Census Bureau reports there were 5.9 million uninsured children in 2013.

“Surveys have repeatedly shown that about two-thirds of the public supports a Medicare-for-all approach,” he said, “and recent surveys show physician support is also strong and growing. Hundreds of labor, civic and faith-based organizations have endorsed this model of deep-going reform.

“As a doctor who sees the children of hard-pressed parents every day, I can tell you that the need for fundamental health care reform has never been greater,” he said. “It’s time to stop putting the interests of private insurance companies and Big Pharma over patient needs. It’s time to adopt a single-payer, improved-Medicare-for-all program in the United States.”

A summary of the basic provisions of H.R. 676 is available here.

http://www.pnhp.org/news/2015/february/doctors-group-hails-reintroduction-of-medicare-for-all-bill

Issued by:

Kay Tillow
All Unions Committee for Single Payer Health Care–HR 676
c/o Nurses Professional Organization (NPO)
1169 Eastern Parkway, Suite 2218
Louisville, KY 40217
(502) 636 1551

Email: nursenpo@aol.com 
http://unionsforsinglepayer.org

https://www.facebook.com/unionsforsinglepayer

02/09/2015

AfricaFocus Bulletin
February 18, 2015 (150218)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

“The G8 New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition was launched in
2012 by the eight most industrialised countries to mobilise private
capital for investment in African agriculture. To be accepted into
the programme, African governments are required to make important
changes to their land and seed policies. … [for example] Despite
the fact that more than 80% of all seed in Africa is still produced
and disseminated through ‘informal’ seed systems (on-farm seed
saving and unregulated distribution between farmers), there is no
recognition in the New Alliance programme of the importance of
farmer-based systems of saving, sharing, exchanging and selling
seeds.” – Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa and GRAIN, January
2015

For a version of this Bulletin in html format, more suitable for
printing, go to http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/ag1502.php, and
click on “format for print or mobile.”

To share this on Facebook, click on
https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/ag1502.php

Countless reports by global and African agencies highlight the
critical role for agriculture in African development. Almost all
agree that small farmers are key to addressing poverty and food
insecurity. But many policies, such as those described in this new
report from the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa and GRAIN,
lead in practice to empowerment of agribusiness giants rather than
small farmers. By imposing legal frameworks based on Western
industrial agriculture, powerful interests make a mockery of
international pledges to help small farmers.

This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains excerpts from the report “Land
and Seed Laws under Attack: Who is pushing changes in Africa?” (full
report available at http://tinyurl.com/m5g8zje)

For summary talking points and previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on
food and agriculture issues, visit
http://www.africafocus.org/intro-ag.php

There are a host of reports on specific cases of land grabs and
sometimes on successful challenges to them. The sources cited below
are only a sampling.

For a report by Nigerian and international groups on a recent
contested case of land grabbing in Taraba state in eastern Nigeria
(a rice plantation under the control of U.S.-based agribusiness firm
Dominion Farms), see http://tinyurl.com/pr463qr

For a recent case in Senegal, researched by ActionAid, visit
http://tinyurl.com/mrhhuy4 For more information on ActionAid work on
land rights, visit http://tinyurl.com/pdt7kny

For a case in Ghana, where Herakles Farms abandoned its investments
after community protests, see the report by the Africa Faith and
Justice Network (http://afjn.org; direct URL:
http://tinyurl.com/mfftstg).

In addition to the organizations cited in this report, and the cases
just cited, AfricaFocus particularly recommends, for case studies
and current information on the status of land grabbing in Africa,
the website of the Oakland Institute at
http://www.oaklandinstitute.org/land-rights-issue The Oakland
Institute and other groups are active in a campaign to have the
World Bank stop promoting land grabs through its “doing business”
ratings. Visit http://ourlandourbusiness.org/ for more details.

For extensive research on seeds and food sovereignty in Africa, see
also the website of the African Centre for Biosafely (
http://www.acbio.org.za/)

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Ebola Perspectives

[AfricaFocus is regularly monitoring and posting links on
Ebola on social media. For
additional links, see http://www.facebook.com/AfricaFocus]

New and of particular interest:

Jina Moore, Buzzfeed, February 12 http://tinyurl.com/mjagccr – map
showing Liberia “very close” to end of Ebola. Total number of days
since last case over 21 in all counties except Montserrado
(Monrovia)

WHO, Situation Report, February 11 http://tinyurl.com/lygs4b5
Not quite as optimistic. “Total weekly case incidence increased for
the second consecutive week, with 144 new confirmed cases reported
in the week to 8 February.” Cases up in Guinea and Sierra Leone,
although still low in Liberia.

Shawn Radcliffe, Healthline, “Ebola Crisis Eases in Africa. Now
What?” February 12 http://tinyurl.com/n8p7csf
Need for vigilance, plus long-term planning for recovery of
economies & building sustainable health systems

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

Land and Seed Laws under Attack: Who is pushing changes in Africa?

Report

Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA; http://afsafrica.org)
and GRAIN ( http://www.grain.org)

[Full text of report at http://tinyurl.com/m5g8zje and
http://www.grain.org /e/5121]

January 2015

Who is pushing changes in Africa?

…

A battle is raging for control of resources in Africa — land,
water, seeds, minerals, ores, forests, oil, renewable energy
sources. Agriculture is one of the most important theatres of this
battle. Governments, corporations, foundations and development
agencies are pushing hard to commercialise and industrialise African
farming.

Many of the key players are well known. They are committed to
helping agribusiness become the continent’s primary food commodity
producer. To do this, they are not only pouring money into projects
to transform farming operations on the ground — they are also
changing African laws to accommodate the agribusiness agenda.

Privatising both land and seeds is essential for the corporate model
to flourish in Africa. With regard to agricultural land, this means
pushing for the official demarcation, registration and titling of
farms. It also means making it possible for foreign investors to
lease or own farmland on a long-term basis. With regard to seeds, it
means having governments require that seeds be registered in an
official catalogue in order to be traded. It also means introducing
intellectual property rights over plant varieties and criminalising
farmers who ignore them. In all cases, the goal is to turn what has
long been a commons into something that corporates can control and
profit from.

This survey aims to provide an overview of just who is pushing for
which specific changes in these areas — looking not at the plans
and projects, but at the actual texts that will define the new
rules. It was not easy to get information about this … We did
learn a few things, though:

* While there is a lot of civil society attention focused on the
G8’s New Alliance for Food and Nutrition, there are many more actors
doing many similar things across Africa. Our limited review makes it
clear that the greatest pressure to change land and seed laws comes
from Washington DC — home to the World Bank, USAID and the MCC
[Millennium Challenge Corporation].

* Land certificates — which should be seen as a stepping stone to
formal land titles — are being promoted as an appropriate way to
“securitise” poor peoples’ rights to land. But how do we define the
term “land securitisation”? As the objective claimed by most of the
initiatives dealt with in this report, it could be understood as
strengthening land rights. Many small food producers might conclude
that their historic cultural rights to land — however they may be
expressed — will be better recognised, thus protecting them from
expropriation. But for many governments and corporations, it means
the creation of Western-type land markets based on formal
instruments like titles and leases that can be traded. … So in a
world of grossly unequal players, “security” is shorthand for
market, private property and the power of the highest bidder.

* Most of today’s initiatives to address land laws, including those
emanating from Africa, are overtly designed to accommodate, support
and strengthen investments in land and large-scale land deals,
rather than achieve equity or to recognise longstanding or
historical community rights over land at a time of rising conflicts
over land and land resources.

* Most of the initiatives to change current land laws come from
outside Africa. Yes, African structures like the African Union and
the Pan-African Parliament are deeply engaged in facilitating
changes to legislation in African states, but many people question
how “indigenous” these processes really are. It is clear that
strings are being pulled, by Washington and Europe in particular, to
alter land governance in Africa.

* When it comes to seed laws, the picture is reversed. Subregional
African bodies — SADC, COMESA, OAPI and the like — are working to
create new rules for the exchange and trade of seeds. But the
recipes they are applying — seed marketing restrictions and plant
variety protection schemes — are borrowed directly from the US and
Europe.

* The changes to seed policy being promoted by the G8 New Alliance,
the World Bank and others refer to neither farmer-based seed systems
nor farmers’ rights. They make no effort to strengthen farming
systems that are already functioning. Rather, the proposed solutions
are simplified, but unworkable solutions to complex situations that
will not work — though an elite category of farmers may enjoy some
small short term benefits.

…

* With seeds, which represent a rich cultural heritage of Africa’s
local communities, the push to transform them into income-generating
private property, and marginalise traditional varieties, is still
making more headway on paper than in practice. This is due to many
complexities, one of which is the growing awareness of and popular
resistance to the seed industry agenda. But the resolve of those who
intend to turn Africa into a new market for global agroinput
suppliers is not to be underestimated. The path chosen will have
profound implications for the capacity of African farmers to adapt
to climate change.

This report was drawn up jointly by the Alliance for Food
Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA) and GRAIN. AFSA is a pan-African
platform comprising networks and farmer organisations championing
small African family farming based on agro-ecological and indigenous
approaches that sustain food sovereignty and the livelihoods of
communities. GRAIN is a small international organisation that aims
to support small farmers and social movements in their struggles for
community-controlled and biodiversity-based food systems.

The report was researched and initially drafted by Mohamed
Coulibaly, an independent legal expert in Mali, with support from
AFSA members and GRAIN staff. …

Initiatives targeting both land and seed laws

G8 New Alliance on Food Security and Nutrition – Initiated by the G8
countries: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, UK and US

– Timeframe: 2012-2022

РImplemented in 10 African countries: Benin, Burkina Faso, C̫te
d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Senegal and
Tanzania

The G8 New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition was launched in
2012 by the eight most industrialised countries to mobilise private
capital for investment in African agriculture. To be accepted into
the programme, African governments are required to make important
changes to their land and seed policies. The New Alliance
prioritises granting national and transnational corporations (TNCs)
new forms of access and control to the participating countries’
resources, and gives them a seat at the same table as aid donors and
recipient governments. As of July 2014, ten African countries had
signed Cooperative Framework Agreements (CFAs) to implement the New
Alliance programme. Under these agreements, these governments
committed to 213 policy changes. Some 43 of these changes target
land laws, with the overall stated objective of establishing “clear,
secure and negotiable rights to land” — tradeable property titles.

The New Alliance also aims to implement both the Voluntary
Guidelines (VGs) on Responsible Land Tenure adopted by the Committee
on World Food Security in 2012, and the Principles for Responsible
Agriculture Investment drawn up by the World Bank, FAO, IFAD and UN
Conference on Trade and Development. This is considered especially
important since the New Alliance directly facilitates access to
farmland in Africa for investors. To achieve this, the New Alliance
Leadership Council, a self-appointed body composed of public and
private sector representatives, in September 2014 decided to come up
with a single set of guidelines to ensure that the land investments
made through the Alliance are “responsible” and not land grabs. As
to seeds, all of the participating states, with the exception of
Benin, agreed to adopt plant variety protection laws and rules for
marketing seeds that better support the private sector. Despite the
fact that more than 80% of all seed in Africa is still produced and
disseminated through ‘informal’ seed systems (on-farm seed saving
and unregulated distribution between farmers), there is no
recognition in the New Alliance programme of the importance of
farmer-based systems of saving, sharing, exchanging and selling
seeds.

African governments are being co-opted into reviewing their seed
trade laws and supporting the implementation of Plant Variety
Protection (PVP) laws. The strategy is to first harmonise seed trade
laws such as border control measures, phytosanitary control, variety
release systems and certification standards at the regional level,
and then move on to harmonising PVP laws. The effect is to create
larger unified seed markets, in which the types of seeds on offer
are restricted to commercially protected varieties. The age old
rights of farmers to replant saved seed is curtailed and the
marketing of traditional varieties of seed is strictly prohibited.

Concerns have been raised about how this agenda privatises seeds and
the potential impacts this could have on small-scale farmers.
Farmers will lose control of seeds regulated by a commercial system.
There are also serious concerns about the loss of biodiversity
resulting from a focus on commercial varieties.

…

The World Bank

The World Bank is a significant player in catalysing the growth and
expansion of agribusiness in Africa. It does this by financing
policy changes and projects on the ground. In both cases, the Bank
targets land and seed laws as key tools for advancing and protecting
the interests of the corporate sector.

The Bank’s work on policy aims at increasing agricultural production
and productivity through programmes called “Agriculture Development
Policy Operations” (AgDPOs).

Besides financing AgDPOs, the World Bank directly supports
agriculture development projects. Some major World Bank projects
with land tenure components are presented in Annex 2, with a focus
on the legal arrangements developed to make land available for
corporate investors. These projects are much more visible than the
AgDPOs and their names are well known in each country: PDIDAS in
Senegal, GCAP in Ghana, Bagrépole in Burkina. …

Initiatives targeting land laws

African Union Land Policy Initiative

…

The African Union (AU), together with the African Development Bank
(AfDB) and the UN Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), has been
spearheading a Land Policy Initiative (LPI) since 2006. Mainly a
response to land grabbing on the continent, the LPI is meant to
strengthen and change national policies and laws on land. It is
funded by the EU, IFAD, UN Habitat, World Bank, France and
Switzerland. LPI is expected to become an African Centre on Land
Policies after 2016.

The LPI is designed to implement the African Declaration on Land
Issues and Challenges, adopted by the AU Summit of Heads of State in
July 2009. …

One important undertaking of the LPI is the development of a set of
Guiding Principles on Large-Scale Land-Based Investments (LSLBI)
meant to ensure that land acquisitions in Africa “promote inclusive
and sustainable development”. The Guiding Principles were adopted by
the Council of agriculture ministers in June 2014, and are awaiting
endorsement by the AU Summit of Heads of States and government.

The Guiding Principles have several objectives, including guiding
decision making on land deals (recognising that large scale land
acquisitions may not be the most appropriate form of investment);
providing a basis for a monitoring and evaluation framework to track
land deals in Africa; and providing a basis for reviewing existing
large scale land contracts. The Guiding Principles draw lessons from
global instruments and initiatives to regulate land deals including
the Voluntary Guidelines and the Principles for Responsible
Agricultural Investments in the Context of Food Security and
Nutrition. They also take into account relevant human rights
instruments. But because the Guiding Principles are not a binding
instrument and lack an enforcement mechanism, it is far from certain
that they will prove any more effective than other voluntary
frameworks on land. They are, however, widely accepted and supported
on the continent as the first “African response” to the issue of
land grabbing.

[For more on other similar initiatives see full report]

Initiatives introducing seed laws

Under the rubric “seeds laws” there are various types of legal and
policy initiatives that directly affect what kind of seeds small
scale farmers can use. We focus on two: intellectual property laws,
which grant state-sanctioned monopolies to plant breeders (at the
expense of farmers’ rights), and seed marketing laws, which regulate
trade in seeds (often making it illegal to exchange or market
farmers’ seeds).

Plant Variety Protection

Plant variety protection (PVP) laws are specialised intellectual
property rules designed to establish and protect monopoly rights for
plant breeders over the plants types (varieties) they have
developed. PVP is an offshoot of the patent system. All members of
the World Trade Organization (WTO) are obliged to adopt some form of
PVP law, according to the WTO’s Agreement on Trade- Related Aspects
of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). But how they do so is up to
national governments.

African Regional Intellectual Property Organisation (ARIPO) draft
PVP Protocol

– Draft PVP Protocol to be implemented in the 19 ARIPO member
states: Botswana, Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique,
Namibia, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Rwanda, São Tomé and Príncipe,
Somalia, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

ARIPO is the regional counterpart of the UN’s World Intellectual
Property Organisation (WIPO) for Anglophone Africa. It was
established under the Lusaka Agreement signed in 1976. In November
2009, ARIPO’s Council of Ministers approved a proposal for ARIPO to
develop a policy and legal framework which would form the basis for
the development of the ARIPO Protocol on the Protection of New
Varieties of Plants (the PVP Protocol). Adopted in November 2013,
the legal framework was formulated into a Draft PVP Protocol in 2014
during a diplomatic conference.

The Draft PVP Protocol establishes unified procedures and
obligations for the protection of plant breeder’s rights in all
ARIPO member states. These rights will be granted by a single
authority established by ARIPO to administer the whole system on
behalf of its member states.

The Protocol is based on the rules contained in the 1991 Act of the
UPOV Convention. It therefore establishes legal monopolies
(“protection”) on new plant varieties for 20-25 years, depending on
the crop. Farmers will not be able to save and re-use seed from
these varieties on their own farms except for specifically
designated crops, within reasonable limits, and upon annual payment
of royalties. Under no circumstances will they be able to exchange
or sell seeds harvested from such varieties. …

The Protocol is hotly contested by civil society. AFSA, for
instance, is on record for vehemently opposing the ARIPO PV Protocol
on the grounds that it, inter alia, severely erodes farmers’ rights
and the right to food. On the other hand, industry associations have
been consulted extensively in the process of drafting the ARIPO PVP
Protocol. …

[For more on other similar initiatives, see full report.]

Seed marketing rules

The second category of seed laws consists of rules governing seeds
marketing in and among countries. A number of current initiatives
aim to harmonise these rules among African states belonging to the
same Regional Economic Community. But through harmonisation, states
are actually being encouraged to “liberalise” the seed market. This
means limiting the role of the public sector in seed production and
marketing, and creating new space and new rights for the private
sector instead. In this process, farmers lose their freedom to
exchange and/or sell their own seeds. This legal shift is
deliberately meant to lead to the displacement and loss of peasant
seeds, because they are considered inferior and unproductive
compared to corporate seeds.

Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA)

The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) was established
in 2006 by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Rockefeller
Foundation. It is currently funded by several development
ministries, foundations and programmes, including DFID, IFAD and the
Government of Kenya. AGRA’s objective is to “catalyse a uniquely
African Green Revolution based on small- holder farmers so that
Africa would be food self-sufficient and food secure.” AGRA focuses
on five areas: seeds, soil health, market access, policy and
advocacy and support to farmers’ organisations.

On seeds, AGRA’s activities are implemented through the Programme
for Africa’s Seed Systems (PASS). PASS focuses on the breeding,
production and distribution of so-called “improved” seeds. AGRA’s
action on seeds policies and laws, however, is carried out through
its Policy Programme, whose goal is to establish an “enabling
environment”, including seed and land policy reforms, to boost
private investment in agriculture and encourage farmers to change
practices. This specifically includes getting the public sector out
of seed production and distribution.

AGRA’s seed policy work aims to strengthen internal seed laws and
regulations, reduce delays in the release of new varieties,
facilitate easy access to public germplasm, support the
implementation of regionally harmonised seed laws and regulations,
eliminate trade restrictions and establish an African Seed
Investment Fund to support seed businesses.

In Ghana, for example, AGRA helped the government review its seed
policies with the goal of identifying barriers to the private sector
getting more involved. With technical and financial support from
AGRA, the country’s seed legislation was revised and a new pro-
business seed law was passed in mid-2010. Among other things it
established a register of varieties that can be marketed. In
Tanzania, discussions between AGRA and government representatives
facilitated a major policy change to privatise seed production. In
Malawi, AGRA supported the government in revising its maize pricing
and trade policies. AGRA is also funding a $300,000 seeds project
for the East African Community that started in July 2014 and will be
implemented over the next two years. Its objective is to get EAC
farmers to switch to so-called improved seeds and to harmonise the
seed and fertilizer policies of Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and
Uganda.

[For more on other similar initiatives, see full report]

*****************************************************

AfricaFocus Bulletin is an independent electronic publication
providing reposted commentary and analysis on African issues, with a
particular focus on U.S. and international policies. AfricaFocus
Bulletin is edited by William Minter.

AfricaFocus Bulletin can be reached at africafocus@igc.org. Please
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HAVANA, Cuba, Jan 15 (acn) Cuban doctor Felix Baez, who overcame the Ebola virus, which he got in Sierra Leone, returned to that Western African nation to continue fighting the disease along his comrades with the Henry Reeve international medical brigade.

Cubadebate website published a series of photos of the doctor along his comrades in Sierra Leone announcing his return.

An internal medicine specialist, Baez announced in December 2014 that he would return to the African nation to finish the job he started, once he fully recovered from the disease.

The 43-year-old doctor returned to Cuba after having been released from the Geneva-based Cantonal University Hospital, where he received treatment against Ebola.

In response to the World Health Organization call to fight Ebola in Africa, Cuba sent three brigades to Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea to fight the virus.

According to the World Health Organization over 8 thousand 800 people have died from the Ebola virus in Africa.

================================================
LAST MEMBERS OF CUBAN FIVE RETURNING TO CUBA:

By Houston Communist Party

The recent upsurge in interest in socialism and communism prompted us to write this article as a clarification of how we would envision a socialist society in the U.S A recent Rasmussen poll indicated that 11% of U.S. voters believe that communism is morally superior to capitalism. This means that in spite of the campaign of misinformation that has been ongoing since the early part of the 20th century, 34 million people in this country believe that communism is morally superior to capitalism.

This paper is largely based on how the classic works of Marxism-Leninism envision a socialist society. Of course, the classic works also maintain that socialism would be developed differently in various sovereign nations according to democratic struggles and the historical context of the various societies in which socialism develops.

Let us examine what these key terms mean for working people and how they might be worked out in a developing socialist society.

Private property

Many people in the U.S. do not know the meaning of socialism and have little understanding about it, although the label “socialist” is often bandied about these days. Most people misunderstand concepts like social-ownership simply because they do not know what Marx and Lenin meant when they talked about “Private Property.”

Private property, when referred to by communists, only refers to private ownership of industry or the means of production; the things you own personally are not private property in this sense. Marx and Lenin would just call them personal belongings. Socialist economic systems seek to end private property by making the means of production collectively owned and democratically operated by the workers; the state protects the workers’ ownership of the means of production. This means real democracy in the workplace.

In a socialist system, the state would not come and take your things; that’s nonsense! The mainstream media (e.g. Fox News) would have you believe that socialists and communists will take your fingernails and toenails. Nothing could be further from the truth. Lenin wrote that if people try to accumulate and hoard publicly-owned property for their own private gain, then they will have all their personal belongings confiscated and will be sent to prison. But he never says anything about personal belongings in any other sense. The only ideology on the left in which theorists advocate the abolition of all personal belongings are the ultra-left deviations such as anarchism and Maoism. So it is very important to be precise when speaking about private property.

It is important to remember that the capitalist system leads the way in confiscation of working people’s property. The bottom 60% of households in this country owns only 4% of the nation’s wealth. The top 1% owns 37% of all the capital and the top 10% owns 90% of all capital. So, it is important to consider who is seizing what.

Rights of the capitalists

The bourgeoisie (the current ultra-wealthy, ruling class in capitalist countries that own all of the means of production, but do none of the work) will have their rights curtailed. The word “freedom” in capitalist countries has generally been used to refer to the rights of the capitalist to oppress, and exploit the workers in order to maximize profits. Socialist countries who do not extend the freedom to capitalists to exploit workers are deemed to be “not free” by the capitalists and their cheerleaders, which historically has included hypocritical politicians and other community leaders such as right wing clergy, professors and teachers. Some union leaders have also fallen into this trap. Capitalists in a socialist society would be forced to follow the will of the people and maintain dignity and respect in the workplace and would accrue severe penalties for discriminatory, oppressive and exploitative workplace practices.

In a socialist system, the workers would become the ruling class and as such would be fully compensated for their labor which is the basis of all wealth. Profits for the capitalists would be severely curtailed and eventually phased out. When capitalists and their cheerleaders smear socialists by branding them “totalitarian, and undemocratic”, we have to ask with whose democratic rights are they concerned. The answer is obvious, they are concerned about the freedom of capitalists to steal from their workers and amass great fortunes based on the labor of people other than themselves.

Universal health care, socialism vs. reformism

Socialism is not defined by reforms. For example, universal health care is not a defining feature of socialism. Universal health care is one of the many goals of a developing socialist society and it would represent an incremental improvement in any system, capitalist or socialist, since it would make health care accessible to all peoples. However, some capitalist systems have achieved universal health care, but are not socialist economies.
A socialist society would provide health care based on need, not ability to pay. Lenin argued that it is necessary that health care delivery increase in socialist systems to meet the public demand for health services. Hospitals and clinics would be built and organized based on the concrete needs of the community rather than consideration of the “profit margin.”

What does socialism do?

What is the purpose of socialism? To raise the material (i.e. concrete) standard of living of the workers, end the exploitation of one person by another, end all forms of oppression, end racism and sexism, end patriarchy and white-supremacy, end the violence of imperialist warfare, and eventually reach the goal of communism, a society without the struggle between the classes.

How do you identify a socialist country? By asking a very simple question: who owns the means of production and who controls the state? If the answer is the workers, then it is a socialist country. If it is the bourgeoisie, it is a capitalist country (no matter how liberal or “social-democratic” it is). In socialist countries, commodity production for private profit ends; production is no longer designed for the sake of the market, but rather determined by the actual needs of the people.

How does socialism happen?

Socialism must go through many stages. Unfortunately, it is difficult to specify these stages. As Marx pointed out, these stages are necessarily relative to the individual societies that develop socialism. One of the important tasks of communists is to figure out what these stages are in their societies and to educate the workers accordingly. Important questions like “what stage of socialism are we in?” should have a definite answer based on the existing material conditions and historical developments of the community in which they develop.

In the first stages of socialism, the goal is to raise the material standard of living for the working people. That means raising wages and benefits for workers. Socialist societies would provide everyone an opportunity to get an education and this will be most important for the workers. The purpose of education in a capitalist society is to train workers both for manual and intellectual labor. In capitalist countries, worker’s exposure to and preparation for appreciation of the arts and cultures of the world is very limited. A socialist education would give workers the capacity to fully enjoy and appreciate literature, art and music and would prepare them to think critically and understand scientific concepts. In a socialist system, workers would be trained to develop their own art as an expression of their own consciousness of the environment in which they live.

What would communism look like?

As the stages of socialism progress, the workers will eventually attain a comfortable standard of living and will have received a thorough education. All workers will have access both to public libraries and their own books, all of the wisdom of the ages being available to them, just because they are human beings and thus deserve all of the fruits of humanity.

Only when the final goals of socialism are met and a communist society is established will people truly be free; for in capitalist countries, most of the things that people call freedoms are really false freedoms. The freedom to buy one commodity over another is not true freedom. The freedom to choose McDonald’s over Burger King is not freedom. Neither the workers of McDonald’s nor Burger King have any say so over how these corporations are run. The community does not participate in the decisions made about how these companies produce their food. The decisions are made based on the owner’s best guess as to what product will maximize their profits.

There is no such thing as “economic freedom” in a society based on class exploitation. Only in a communist society, where the working class is no longer prevented from living the good life based on their lack of money, will there truly be freedom for all.

Who can make this happen?

Only the working class can liberate itself and claim its historic role. Only the working class can break the chains of capitalism and pave the bright path to true freedom. This can only be done by organizing and unifying the working people of this nation and the world. When working people unite and fight for their rights, it will be possible for the working class to become the ruling class. This is what we are about. This is the side that communists have fought for historically. We want a truly egalitarian and democratic society by the workers, of the workers and for the workers.