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The figures shown in the first part of this work misleadingly show inequality and reduce/dilute it in one way or another. Inequality in the distribution of the real economy is larger than the figures show, for the following reasons:
- Many non-whites do not own homes or other real estate and businesses. A significant part of their already lower income is used to pay rent or mortgages on houses and cars.
- Significant differences within the same social or demographic group. For example, between rich and poor Blacks and Hispanics. It’s not just because of income, but also because of whether or not you have health insurance, better or worse access to education, housing overcrowding, etc.
- Inequality is amplified when we go beyond tangible or quantifiable factors, including social rejection, police scrutiny and abuse, among other “invisible” manifestations or rendered invisible by the media (they prefer to misinform about Ukraine etc. than deal with internal problems take care of). the USA). A vicious circle that increasingly disadvantages them.
It is important to note that this inequality is not only manifested in human groups, but also in regional factors that are heavily involved in the possibilities of contagion and death. These factors are also reflected in how many people have been fully vaccinated, particularly minors. This is shown in the table below:
In blue, states with a Democratic Party majority, in red, a Republican majority. Notable is the marked difference in favor of majority states and Democratic Party governments (9 of the top 10 states) in the percentage of vaccinated versus Republicans (9 of the bottom 10). The table was prepared by J. Oro based on data from CDC and Worldmeter.
The national average of Covid deaths per million people in the United States so far is 3015. The top ten states with the highest vaccination coverage are around 2400 and the bottom ten are just over 3500, or 46%. higher mortality. If we compare it to Cuba, with 751 deaths per million population, our country has a lower mortality than any of the 56 states and other entities of the United States (50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, Guam, Samoa, Northern Mariana Islands). Cuba would have a 29% difference in favor of Hawaii, the best in the United States in this tragic index.
In short, the assessment of inequality allows us to discuss to what extent the economic models adopted by American society over the past few decades do or do not respond, albeit limitedly, to social advances or setbacks designed to increase inequality and to uphold the privileges of the rich. The main cause of inequality is obviously class society itself.
The vulnerability of poor sectors in many countries, even in the economically advanced, has been dramatically highlighted by the Covid-19 pandemic. Infections and deaths were significantly higher among the poor and minorities. This has been particularly evident in the United States, which is suffering from two pandemics: that caused by SARS-CoV-2 and represented by the Trump administration (2017-2021) and the current one by J. Biden, which despite all his promises hasn’t even remotely done what is needed to even slightly eliminate the inequality indices.
A Million Dead Later: Has the United States Learned a Lesson?
Having passed the peak or epidemic moment of AIDS and another world crisis with the Ebola virus decades ago, we are living (and dying) in a different pandemic today. What we didn’t have with AIDS, we now have, vaccines against Covid-19, and which, according to the specialists, are also revolutionary in their concept. Cuba has excelled in this regard.
More than two years of destruction, devastation and misfortune of all kinds have already passed with the Covid. The desire to return to normal life is evident in many people and a fairly significant level of demobilization is observed. The fact that we want to defeat Covid does not mean that this disease has passed its epidemic phase. The terrible virus will be with us for the foreseeable future, also haunting the dividing lines of social and economic inequality in the United States (and other countries) discussed above. It is likely to remain very active in less developed countries where people do not have adequate access to coronavirus vaccines due to poor health systems, financial inability and the greed of pharmaceutical companies.
What will it take to effectively fight the pandemic in the United States after a million deaths and everywhere?
The best definitions of what humanity needs to face seriously the challenge of Covid and health in general on a global scale have been provided by Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel and other senior officials in Cuba and abroad, the UN and others international forums.
In the midst of an unprecedented crisis that has killed a million people, the United States government has allocated budgets for military and other related spending that exceed the astronomical figure of $1,000,000 million (of which more than 700,000 million in the Department of Defense), with an increase of between 70,000 and 100,000 million over the previous budget. To give an example, a new “Gerald Ford” class aircraft carrier costs more than 13,000 million (equivalent to the GDP of countries like Moldova or Namibia) and they are completely unnecessarily building four of this or similar type, for a total of 55,000 million. How much could be advanced in social progress with such cleverly used resources, especially in the health sector! But the Military Industrial Complex in the United States has the final say.
A new aircraft carrier of the “Gerald Ford” class costs more than 13,000 million dollars, four capital ships are being built or commissioned for the US Navy. (Photo by Breaking Defense).
The attempt to use Ukraine as a Trojan horse against Russia has created a global uncertainty reminiscent of the October 1962 Crisis. The “rogue” media, with a flood of highly questionable information about this crisis, has caused the people of the United States to look elsewhere and not pay the attention they deserve his own country had a death toll that surpassed its casualties in any foreign war in US history, including World War I and World War II, plus the Korean, Vietnam, and many other wars. That shameful death toll, a symbol of the failure of the world’s greatest power to defend its own people, is just another statistic completely overshadowed by the avalanche of misinformation about Russian “aggression” in Ukraine.
On the other hand, with limited financial capacity and in the midst of a terrible, brutal blockade, Cuba has set very solid examples for the future that should be used as a guide by countries with far more economic and technological resources. Enormous scientific achievements with modest financial amounts, thousands of doctors and medical personnel serving not only Cuba but also many countries, including some highly developed ones.
If the United States does not act decisively in this direction, towards international cooperation and not to attack or sanction countries left and right, these millions of victims of Covid will have died in vain.