American journal of public health
-
This paper examines the combined effects of a severe economic decline since 1989 and a tightening of the US embargo in 1992 on health and health care in Cuba. ⋯ To be consistent with international humanitarian law, embargoes must not impede access to essential humanitarian goods. Yet this embargo has raised the cost of medical supplies and food Rationing, universal access to primary health services, a highly educated population, and preferential access to scarce goods for women and children help protect most Cubans from what otherwise might have been a health disaster.