[escepticos] Sobre la situacion sanitaria en la Argentina

["Ramón Díaz-Alersi" <rda@...>]

El último número de la revista "The Lancet" publica esta noticia:

Heart-bypass pioneer's death puts Argentine health care in spotlight

Lancet 2000; 356: 492

The chaos surrounding Argentina's once-vaunted health system appears to have
claimed its most distinguished victim to date: Rene Favaloro, the pioneering
cardiovascular surgeon who did the world's first heart-bypass operation in
1967. Favaloro, aged 77, was found dead in his Buenos Aires apartment on
July 29, with a gunshot wound to the chest. Police found a handgun near the
body. Letters of farewell were also discovered. July 31 was declared a day
of national mourning by the country's President, Fernando de la Rua, who
paid tribute to Favaloro's "deep love and attachment to his country",
recalling that Favaloro "resigned a brilliant medical career in the US, that
would have brought him wealth, to return to Argentina (where he had begun as
a humble rural doctor) bringing along his experience and talent".

It was during a 10-year stay in the USA that Favaloro performed the first
bypass operation in 1967 at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio, one of several
American medical centres at which Favaloro developed his techniques.
However, Favarolo's exalted professional status failed to insulate him from
the disorder afflicting Argentina's health system, dominated by
state-controlled contributory health/welfare benefit organisations which
offer either financial cover or direct health-service provision through
their own hospitals and clinics.

After Favaloro's death, it was disclosed that in June he had written a
personal letter to the editor of the country's leading broadsheet, La
Nacion, warning that the organisation he created in the 1970s, the Favaloro
Cardiological Surgical Foundation faced insolvency and closure. "I am going
through one of the most difficult moments of my life", he wrote. "The
Foundation has major financial problems as a consequence of what is
happening in our country. We are owed $18 million and it is getting
progressively more difficult to continue with our daily work which--as
always--we offer to the entire community without discrimination, using the
best technology available and the most highly qualified staff, quite apart
from our teaching and and research functions."

Officials at the Foundation disclosed that the total level of indebtedness
could be as high as $50 million. They identified as major debtors the
state-owned Instituto de Obra Medico Asistencial (IOMA) and Instituto
Nacional de Servicios Sociales para Jubilados y Pensionados (PAMI). IOMA is
facing its own crisis as fraud investigators continue their probe into a
$100 million "black hole" in the organisation's finances. (see Lancet, July
8 , p 146) Favaloro had lamented in his June letter to the press: "Most of
the time, even minor officials at organisations such as PAMI do not bother
to return my calls." However, officials at the Favaloro Foundation also
pointed out that the government itself had contributed to the organisation's
financial woes by cancelling an $8 million annual federal grant, as part of
the austerity measures taken by the new administration headed by President
de la Rua.

Tributes to Favaloro's pioneering work were paid on his last visit to Europe
when he attended the opening of the Georges Pompidou European Hospital in
Paris, on June 26-27. Juan Carlos Chachques, another Argentine heart-surgery
pioneer who is a director of the Paris hospital, confirmed that Favaloro had
privately expressed his anxieties during the ceremonies in the French
capital. Chachques added: "I have no doubt that this tragedy is a direct
consequence of the financial situation in which Argentina's health system is
embroiled. Dr Favaloro faced the appalling prospect that everything he had
worked to achieve during his professional life was on the point of
disintegration."

Graciela Iglesias-Rogers

Saludos.

RDA