The We Are Patrice Lumumba Coalition is calling on everyone to support the democratic demands of Congo’s doctors and nurses.
For several weeks, medical doctors, led by their trade union Syndicat National Des Médecins (SYNAMED), has helped to expose the criminal neglect of the health of the masses of Africans in Congo.
The doctors’ strike is seeking an improvement in their living and working conditions.
The doctors demand the realization of the promises made by former Prime Minister Adolphe Muzito in 2011.
The promise was the recruitment of a thousand young doctors to Congo’s hospitals, the payment of a minimum wage of 1000 USD, transportation for doctors, the implementation of the special status of physicians and the exemption from taxes on their vehicle purchases.
This is a country with very alarming health statistics.
More than ten percent of the Kinshasa’s population exhibits signs of chronic kidney disease, according to Oxford Journals.
World Bank data from 2002 indicates that both infant mortality (129 per 1,000 live births) and under-five mortality (205 per 1,000 live births) are very high.
In 2001, 31.1 percent of all children under five were underweight for their age and 38.2 percent were nutritionally stunted.
On top of these outrageous figures, medical personnel are poorly and irregularly paid.
The choice in Congo is either to maintain the status quo by continuing to feed imperialism with our resources at our expense, or to use our resources to fund our own health care and development at imperialism’s expense.
In 2009 alone, the Democratic Republic of Congo’s government paid at least 200 million dollars to the imperialist creditors, according to Reuters. This is why we demand an end to all payments to the World Bank, IMF and other imperialist parasitic institutions!
We must reject health care based on ability to pay.
We demand the immediate applications of the following points from the we are Patrice Lumumba Coalition:
- We want a general campaign to eradicate all preventable and curable diseases that are strangling the people in all corners of the country.
- We demand free access to health care for the entire population, including mandatory free health check-ups and corresponding remedies for all workers, peasants, employees at the workplace and all lower ranking and poor soldiers. This will serve to prevent the spread of contagious disease.
- We want the rapid training of doctors, nurses and other medical personnel and the construction of health centers in all corners of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The government must unconditionally pay all medical personnel, including doctors, nurses and traditional birth attendants, a decent living wage so they can invest all their time in taking care of the health of our people.
The ruling class in Congo can always board airplanes and travel to South Africa, Europe or North America to get treatment, but the vast majority of our people are left to die. A person’s health in Congo depends of the amount of dollars in your wallet.
Democracy must mean free access for all people to access health care. We must mobilize everywhere and support the demands of Congo’s doctors and nurses and medical personnel.
We need power in the hands of a revolutionary and democratic national government, which will implement new policies for the benefit of the people. We must immediately stop all payments to the parasite imperialist bankers.
A brief comparison of health expenditures per capita shows the criminal nature of how the colonial budgets work in Africa.
In Cuba, there’s one doctor for every 170 people, more than twice the per-capita U.S. average.
Looking at the number of health care workers for every 10,000 people, Cuba comes on top with 64 doctors and 86 nurses.
Sadly, Cameroon has only two doctors and 16 nurses, while Congo has only one doctor and five nurses for every 10,000 people, according to statistics from the Kaiser Family Foundation.
We want free national health programs for all
Get the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, London and Paris Club out of Africa
Reparations Now!
