The country’s once-famed health system is in tatters. Where did it go wrong?
, Cuba has one of the highest estimated death tolls from the pandemic, relative to its size. Where did it go wrong?
Officially, by August 2022 covid had killed 8,529 of Cuba’s 11m people. But our model estimates that the true toll could be far higher. Excess mortality—the gap between how many people have died in a given period, regardless of cause, and how many deaths would normally have been expected—suggests that up to 62,000 Cubans may have died as a result of the pandemic. That 600% increase over the official toll is probably the result of inadequate testing and other problems.
Cuba’s estimated tally of excess deaths per 100,000 people is 550. This revised death toll would place it among the 20 worst countries in the world. It would also make Cuba an outlier in the region: the average across the Americas is 368. Its ageing population—almost 20% of Cubans are over 60, more than anywhere else in the region—made Cuba especially vulnerable to covid. But other factors were avoidable. Budget cuts and a shortage of essential supplies were taking a toll even before the pandemic. After the outbreak hospitals quickly became overwhelmed; oxygen, personal protective equipment and medicines ran short. And although plenty of Cubans are now vaccinated, the country was slow off the mark.
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