MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Argentine church says child malnutrition stats manipulated; blames corruption and indifference
Argentina's Catholic church warned that the official data on child malnutrition is 'manipulated' to avoid responsibility and rejected the official government argument that the death of some children because of nutrition problems are 'isolated cases'. The statement follows the surfacing of children's deaths of aborigines communities in northern Argentina. Read full article
Comments
Disclaimer & comment rulesI think the hardest thing for most people from the USA to see is the poverty of the 3rd World.
Feb 12th, 2015 - 09:51 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Most of us have no idea how bad it is in the rest of the world.
This is particularly shameful when they have such an abundance of food in Argentina.
The Rgs like to pretend it doesn't exist.
The worst I've ever seen anywhere is the filthy shoeless kids begging in Misiones.
A memory burned in my mind that I can never unsee.
Says it all basically
Feb 12th, 2015 - 10:51 pm - Link - Report abuse 0http://missionjusticeargentina.blogspot.co.uk/2010/07/indigenous-peoples-of-argentina.html
Don’t read this 4th class newspaper
Feb 12th, 2015 - 11:51 pm - Link - Report abuse 0According to INDEC latest figures the Native children doing diet in Chaco and Formosa have risen 40% after watching Disney Channel and buying imperialist Barbie dolls.
@3
Feb 13th, 2015 - 01:45 am - Link - Report abuse 0I do hope your comment was truly sarcastic.
Wow! The Catholic Church is criticising Krass-tina....
I am no fan of the CC but any pressure is welcome.
@1 yankeeboy
Feb 13th, 2015 - 07:43 am - Link - Report abuse 0And the poverty and lack of social medicine in the US?
5. Either you've never been to the USA or you've never been to the 3rd world, which is it?
Feb 13th, 2015 - 11:04 am - Link - Report abuse 0The USA is the only country in the world that has fat homeless.
Riddle me that.
Just a point to make, it is possible to be fat and malnourished. Some of the Villas in Peru have pre-schools full of little fat children but almost all lack balanced nutrition and bear the physical evidence if you know what to look for. One of the main function of the schools is to give them one healthy meal a day with education as a secondary function.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 11:52 am - Link - Report abuse 0That said, we are back to relative levels again. Poor in a developed country is nothing like poor in a developing country. Anyone stating otherwise has no experience of both. The abject poverty in rural areas of Argentina is heartbreaking, especially as we all know they are never getting out of that grinding poverty. The villas of Buenos Aires are awful but they are communities and have access - often by criminal means - to basics. Rural poverty in Argentina is just grim. They are invisible to the Argentine government. Who cares as long as CFK has a new pair of Louboutins.
4.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 12:02 pm - Link - Report abuse 0What do you reckon ?
You know you can always try to have no kids if you can’t feed them, why can’t the Catholic Church just say this?? ... It’s not rocket science, just saying like.
@6 Yankee boy
Feb 13th, 2015 - 12:24 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I have lived in the US and am a frequent visitor, so I repeat “what about social medicine?”.
What about it? I don't want a NHS where you have to wait a decade to get a new hip or something.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 12:27 pm - Link - Report abuse 0NHS is/has ruined the UK.
@10 It is cultural, yb. You love your guns and we love our NHS; neither would travel well across the pond.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 12:37 pm - Link - Report abuse 0True the NHS will never be truly perfect and is hard to even quantify cost-wise but any government trying to change it would do so at their peril. Cradle to grave care, free at the point of use is too ingrained in our society just as the US will never change gun laws.
I don't think my country is ruined. I love the US and go there frequently. I applaud the country of opportunity but I can also see its' faults, just as I can be objective about the U.K.
Re the hip replacement: You don't have to wait a decade for a new one on the NHS and if you want to pay you can have one next week. In the U.S. one might argue if you want to pay you can have it tomorrow but of you can't afford it you wait forever.
Its your country you can do whatever you want.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 12:45 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Anything that has a smell of Socialism/Collectivism will never be well received in the USA. Why should I pay for someone else's life? If they're too lazy or uneducated enough to get a decent wage and pay their own way its their fault not mine.
We need more guns in the USA. If more people were armed there'd be less crime. :)
#12
Feb 13th, 2015 - 01:20 pm - Link - Report abuse 0We need more guns in the USA. If more people were armed there'd be less crime. :)
There would also be fewer people.
Since there are more citizens than criminals the odds are in our favor so I'm willing to take the risk.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 01:45 pm - Link - Report abuse 0CFK wants HSBC to wire back the U$3B in “undeclared” accounts.
Good luck with that...
@12 (shmuck)
Feb 13th, 2015 - 01:59 pm - Link - Report abuse 0“Anything that has a smell of Socialism/Collectivism will never be well received in the USA.”
Duh...what is social security and medicare?
......................................................................................
“ Why should I pay for someone else's life? If they're too lazy or uneducated enough to get a decent wage and pay their own way its their fault not mine.”...
Because it is the ethical thing to do.
Also in many cases, it is not a question of people being lazy. There may be an inability to get an education or a decent paying job for any number of reasons that don't reflect upon the poor character of people.
15. I don't like either SS or Medicare I hope the Repubs dismantle both of them after the next election.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 02:06 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Ethical? Says who? You? Unless they are physically or mentally disabled I have absolutely no sympathy for people who can't make their own way in life and expect the gov't to pay them to get by.
And there you have it, watching trolls, we fundamentally disagree but we didn't hurl insults.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 02:23 pm - Link - Report abuse 0@10. A few years back, I was in the US visiting friends. I picked up an ear infection. I was in agony. Together with my friend, I went to the local hospital. Do you understand the concept of a hospital? It's an institution dedicated to curing sick people. First experience of the 'American dream'? The receptionist wasn't interested in my agony. Just in who was going to pay. My friend wasn't acceptable. An American national resident in the Dallas/Fort Worth area not 'acceptable' in upstate New York. His locally-resident father was accepted as surety. I would be seen. Examination room. Strip off and don gown. For an ear infection? Eventually, some guy purporting to be a doctor appeared. He squeezed through the doorway, remaining about 10 feet away. What a good position from which to examine a nearly naked patient in agony. At last, he summoned up enough courage to approach close enough for an examination. I did try to explain that I was English and civilised. Finally, he managed to write a prescription with his shaking hand. And I had to find a pharmacy. And the 'care' was so wonderful that, within days of returning to the UK, I had a threatening letter and a bill. American healthcare is shit. Don't complain about what you can't do.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 02:24 pm - Link - Report abuse 0@12. I don't have a problem with more guns in the UK. I should be able to protect myself wherever I am. What does that have to do with healthcare? You can't cure cancer with an assault rifle and a bullet. Why should you pay for someone else's life? Why should anyone else pay for yours? Do you have enough money to pay for 40 years' of daily medical care? Are you okay with dying through lack of money? Perhaps your armed compatriots should just shoot you? Go the whole way. They could eat you as well. Read up on civilisation and society. The United States hasn't made it yet. Another 1500 years maybe? Catching up with the more advanced UK. Our only problem is kindness. Non-ethnic British must pay. In pounds. Up front. Or die! Who would care?
Kudos to the Catholic Church for speaking out for the--often forgotten--most impoverished in Argentina. The timing is well chosen: pre-election time is when those pressures have most chances to elicit a response. Let's trust the Church keeps the pressure on whatever government becomes elected later this year.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 02:32 pm - Link - Report abuse 0@18 Didn't you have travel insurance?
Feb 13th, 2015 - 02:44 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I brought up the guns in an earlier post to illustrate the different cultures.
Emergency rooms are for...wait for it, wait for it...emergencies not ear aches unless you have blood coming out of it you should have gone to a urgent care doctor for $40.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 02:52 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Its not the USA's Health Care fault you're friends are too stupid to give you good advice.
BTW Hospitals take credit cards
#12 that is by far the most ridiculous thing you've ever posted. Obviously you've never seen death up close by smalls arms fire. Most people with guns in USA can't fire and maneuver against people anyway. Christ.....are you reincarnated for the wild west?
Feb 13th, 2015 - 03:16 pm - Link - Report abuse 0#18 you make up too many stories. yb is correct......ER are trauma centers and EMERGENCIES. Try an Urgent care ctr...You read to much on the internet. Apparently your friends are not too bright or work to have insurance. But then........they are Texans.
22. Actually that was supposed to be joke. Although I will say the cities with the most stringent “gun controls” do seem to be the ones with the most problems. Chicago I am looking at you...
Feb 13th, 2015 - 03:27 pm - Link - Report abuse 0@8 CD2
Feb 13th, 2015 - 04:00 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Perhaps if the Catholic Church took a more modern view on condom usage, contraception and abortion rights, it might go some way reducing these problems .
Just sayin' like.
Of course it’s the Catholic Church fault that the Indians don’t use contraception pills or a condom.......Riiiiiight, what happened to the good old days of “Hay papi, dame por arriba del lonpa”??
Feb 13th, 2015 - 05:02 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Abortion is a moral and ethical issue by itself.
well it is the CC that has raised the issues above. They seem to be involved. Since they are so knowledgable about the plight couldn't they hand out a few free condoms whilst conducting their surveys?
Feb 13th, 2015 - 05:28 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Or does your Pope not allow that most obvious way to help?
Silly Papa!
The Jesuits and Jeremy Irons teached Indians how to farm and labor in workshops, they taught them how to read and write since the Spaniards arrived. What more do you want them to do?? You want a government nurse or a priest to be present when the act is consummated and put the rubber on the Indian as he is too poor and ignorant to do so himself??
Feb 13th, 2015 - 05:44 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I know that the governors of the North are literally feudal lords, but the natives should be old enough to be responsible for their own lives and taking care of their own kids. You can get condoms in most Argentine hospitals, of course they are pretty bad quality ones, but it’s free.
These current problems can't be blamed on the church. Perhaps they could have been in the past. However it has been amply proven that nothing reduces birth rates more than education and wealth. The more you educate women the less children they have and the longer they wait to start. Increasing income and wealth also have the same effect. These are the preserve of the government. And have been for more than a century. Wealth and education reduce religious power even if they don't reduce religiosity.
Feb 13th, 2015 - 08:08 pm - Link - Report abuse 0However the foundation of these problems do lie with the historical power of the Catholic Church. This is because Spain colonised using the church as its vehicle. This is in strong contrast with Britain that used commerce. Without belittling the destruction both forms caused to native societies, they empowered their societies differently.
It is easy to see when travelling. I'm currently in Mexico City and within 5kms there would be hundreds of churches and one large library finished in 2006. Indeed you could give directions here based solely on churches.
Colonial governments in Latin America perpetuated church power and invested labour, capital and laws building monuments to them and in strengthening that power. In British societies such as Canada, Australia and New Zealand, as businesses and commerce wanted to perpetuate their profits, they relied on strengthening laws, courts and government. This not only protected them but had the side effect of also empowering opposition, competition and the common man.
The differences today are stark. Physically cities such as Melbourne have courts and libraries in magnificent imposing buildings that vie with perhaps 2 main cathedrals whereas in Mexico City the most imposing buildings are almost always solely cathedrals or palaces.
These different foundations still resonate and perpetuate though the centuries. Stronger personal rights, contract and property laws are the main results that Latin America missed out on.
@27 CD2
Feb 14th, 2015 - 03:40 am - Link - Report abuse 0Jeremy Irons?
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000460/
Apparently quite a talented man... I didn't realise he was so involved in such matters...
Oh, and stop putting words in my mouth. I merely pointed out that Argentine Society as a whole might has less problems if it was less enthralled by the insidous power of the Catholic Church.
Free, crappy, condoms but only if you rock up to a State Hospital ? Thats's gotta be a passion-killer in itself!!!
You will never stop people, any people, doing what they are biologically programmed to do......
You just need to be sensible about coping with potential outcomes,
Something the Catholic Church consistently fails to deal with. Thus affecting you, and Argentina.
29.
Feb 14th, 2015 - 05:05 am - Link - Report abuse 0You don’t get it why I mentioned Jeremy Irons along with the Jesuits..
Its that you have no culture no class.
The Catholic Church has no power in Argentina, its a mere NGO.
I agree Cristina's condoms strangle and are shitty, Oh you want a good quality one or contraceptive pills ??? OK fine, no problem. Massive fund raiser campaign to take a sex shop to the Indians all the best quality condoms to be available in the Argentine market
Or….
Get a job and pay for them yourself
@30
Feb 14th, 2015 - 06:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0The Mission. ;)
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