[lbo-talk] health and debt

[Wojtek S]

[WS:]  It is my understand that the apartheid era SA had a robust welfare
state, albeit for whites only.  Neoliberal policies of the post-apartheid
gov't seriously undermined it.  This led to some very peculiar outcomes
which I  observed  in Pretoria a couple of years ago.  Unlike in the US,
most panhandlers were white males.  When I made that observation to my SA
host, he explained that the dismantling of the welfare state had a
particularly harsh effects on poor whites, because blacks developed
extensive social support networks to deal with harsh conditions under
apartheid.

OTOH, a US acquaintance of mine had an emergency hospital visit in Cape
Town.  She was told that, being a foreign citizen, she had to pay for the
service.  Her total bill was about $200 - she commented that she would pay
more for a bandage in a US hospital.

Wojtek

On Mon, May 10, 2010 at 11:27 AM, Ismail Lagardien <ilagardien at yahoo.com>wrote:


>
>
> so.... the calls and letters from collecting agency has arrived
>
> the bill: treatment by a county hospital for flu
>
> this shit didn't even happen in apartheid south africa!
>
>
>
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