[Marxism] BBC article on Cuban biotech/medicine

[John Enyang <x03002f@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4583668.stm>

Cuba - so long dependent on tourism, the export of cigars and nickel for
its survival - has quietly built an impressive healthcare sector that
could transform its troubled economy.

Biotech products made in Cuba used in cases of dialysis and kidney and
liver transplants
Cuban medicine exports help raise foreign currency

Health ministry officials say Cuba's $1.8bn (1bn) and growing tourism
industry will soon be overtaken as the number one foreign exchange earner
by biotechnology joint ventures, vaccine exports and the provision of
health services to other countries.

Successful clinical trials in several countries have already established
Cuba as a world leader in cancer research and treatment.

Last year, Cuba's health budget was boosted by a doubling in biotech
exports to $300m, and the country earns fees from foreign patients and
from exporting other medicinal products and diagnostic equipment and
machines.

Also in 2005, a joint venture biotechnology plant was opened in China,
with Havana providing the transfer of cancer treatment technology, and
this year Cuba is eyeing the West:

German biotech firm Oncoscience is holding clinical trials of anti-cancer
drug TheraCIM h_R3, which it hopes to get registered, and Californian
Cancervax is expected to test another Cuban cancer treatment after
Washington agreed to make an exception to its trade embargo.

<snip>

Now, the hope is that the healthcare sector will help transform Cuba from
a poor developing economy, which is groaning under the weight of more than
40 years of punitive US trade sanctions and suffering due to decades of
economic mismanagement under President Castro.

Whatever the cause of Cuba's difficulties, its many dilapidated buildings,
ramshackle shops and frequent power cuts bear witness to the way its
crumbling, underdeveloped economy coexists with the country's advanced
medical and scientific sector.

<snip>

full:
<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4583668.stm>


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