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Comment by johnchristopher | Hacker News Reader

While I don't debate the efficacy of their healthcare system (wether it's a myth or not) I am surprised their medical research is on par. I would have thought these are two different fields without much overlap. Is it not ? And if it is not how can we explain a country with decades of embargo has an efficient and healthy research medical field ?

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Maybe having nothing to steal, and vanishingly few opportunities for corruption in academia leads to people actually doing the research they are supposed to be doing because there's nothing else to do?

There are plenty of opportunities for corruption in academia in Soviet-style "socialist" countries. It just takes forms other than money.

Not sure that's the reason why, not all research is done in academia. Pharmaceutical research specifically is mostly done in research centres, such as the CIGB, featured in the article, where the vaccine was developed.

Yes, clearly Cuba has achieve the socialist paradise where human nature has been fundamentally changed.

Yet here they are, with a standard of life incomparably higher than their neighbors, and an effective vaccine despite tiny resources. How do you explain that?

Perhaps human nature is that people actually do useful work in some conditions when allowed to?

Higher standard of life than what neighbors? Your average Cuban is far poorer than their neighbors.

Or are you arguing that keeping people in a state of poverty is a good way to motivate their altruistic tendencies?

What are the neighbors of Cuba? What are their GDP PPP per capita?

The only countries next to Cuba that are richer are the US, the Cayman, and the Bahamas.

Two of those don't even have enough population to make it into the 100 biggest cities.

Cuba is below the regional average for the Caribbean at $8,800 per capita. Plenty of wealthier countries.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/802613/gross-domestic-pr...

You must use GDP PPP for Cuba. Cuba is not a market economy and is blockaded, nominal GDP is literally meaningless. This analysis has to provide services such as free housing and so on, which is why most don't give a good estimate.

Then you find 20-26k USD.

Saying the average GDP is 20-26k USD per person is quite laughable. If you've talked to people who have traveled there, it's nowhere close. When you cant even get basic consumer items (medicine, bandages, computers, etc) and certain food products aren't available, you don't have an average GDP of 20-26k USD.

The CIA estimates it at $12k. At $26k USD it would have a standard of living similar to Russia, Turkey or Greece. Which it most certainly does not.

> Then you find 20-26k USD.

Citation needed. You can't just make up your own GDP figures.

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