May Day Speech by Dr. Fidel Castro

PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA, AT THE INTERNATIONAL WORKERS' DAY CELEBRATION IN REVOLUTION SQUARE, HAVANA, MAY 1st 2002
Data excerpted from the Official Translation done on May 3, 2002.
  • For the sake of time, I will outline just a few figures for Latin America as a whole as compared to Cuba. Fidel Castro
  • Illiteracy rate: Latin America, 11.7%; Cuba, 0.2%
  • Inhabitants per teacher: Latin America, 98.4; Cuba, 43, in other words, 2.3 times as many teachers per capita
  • Primary education enrolment ratio: Latin America, 92%; Cuba, 100%
  • Secondary education enrolment ratio: Latin America, 52%; Cuba, 99.7%
  • Primary school students reaching Fifth Grade: Latin America, 76%; Cuba, 100%
  • Infant mortality per thousand live births: Latin America, 32; Cuba, 6.2
  • Medical doctors per hundred thousand inhabitants: Latin America, 160; Cuba, 590
  • Dentists per hundred thousand inhabitants: Latin America, 63; Cuba, 89
  • Nurses per hundred thousand inhabitants: Latin America, 69; Cuba, 743
  • Hospital beds per 100 thousand inhabitants: Latin America, 220; Cuba, 631.6
  • Medically attended births: Latin America, 86.5%; Cuba, 100%
  • Life expectancy at birth: Latin America, 70 years; Cuba, 76 years
  • Population between 15 and 49 years of age infected with HIV/AIDS: Latin America, 0.5%; Cuba, 0.05%
  • Annual AIDS infection rate per million inhabitants, i.e. those who develop the disease: Latin America, 65.25; Cuba, 15.6
  • The first international study of the Latin American Laboratory of Evaluation of educational quality, carried out in 12 Latin American countries including Cuba, produced the following results. Although these data have been already mentioned, I would like to briefly refer to them in detail:
  • In Language, 3rd Grade: Cuba, 85.74 points; the remaining 11 countries, 59.11 points
  • In Language, 4th Grade: Cuba, 87.25; the rest, 63.75
  • In Mathematics, 3rd Grade: Cuba, 87.75; the rest, 58.31
  • In Mathematics, 4th Grade: Cuba, 88.25; the rest, 62.04 Map of Cuba
  • According to these figures, of the seven Latin American countries that voted against Cuba, four --Costa Rica, Chile, Argentina and Uruguay-- that had boasted in the past of being the most advanced in the region, fall well behind Cuban figures. In some of these, they reach or scrape past the half way mark in comparison to Cuba, but in others they are very well below. This is the case of pre-school education for 0-5 year olds, for example, that only reaches 15.8% of the children in that age group in Chile as compared to Cuba's 99.2%.
  • Cuba already occupies worldwide outstanding and hard-to-surpass positions in a growing number of fields essential to guarantee life and the most fundamental political, civil, social, and human rights to ensure the well-being and future of our people. The mass political knowledge of the Cuban people is unrivalled in any other country. Its cultural and social programs and achievements advance at an unprecedented pace.
  • Our dreams become reality. A more humane society is possible, lies and slander notwithstanding. History will bear this out.
    Long live Socialism!
    Motherland or Death!
    We shall overcome!