(C) Common Dreams
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No country should be forced to choose between paying back debts or providing health care [1]
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Date: 2022-05-25 08:20:54+00:00
We know it is the countries with universal and publicly provided healthcare that will be best placed to get through this crisis. Yet in most countries, health services are desperately weak and deeply unequal. You can only get treatment if you have money.
Which brings us to debt.
Faced with an impossible choice – pay back debts or invest in health care
Many countries are burdened with massive amounts of debt owed to richer countries, private banks and multilateral institutions such as the IMF and World Bank.
The level of public external debt accumulated by developing countries is staggering. In 2018 it had reached $457 billion for 73 countries. If we look at 2020 alone, the 76 poorest countries are due to pay $40.6bn. This has constrained their governments from being able to free up resources to spend on public prevention and response.
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[1] Url:
https://www.oxfam.org/en/no-country-should-be-forced-choose-between-paying-back-debts-or-providing-health-care
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