While 218 million children of the world between 5 and 17 years of age are obliged to work - 74 million under age 14 - Cuban children enjoy free education and health care. Commemorating the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human rights two years ago, Brazilian liberation theologist Frei Betto noted that Cuba guarantees three basic rights – food, health, and education.

José Juan Ortiz, the UN Children’s Agency (UNICEF) representative in Cuba, recently spoke of how Cuba puts children first. After each of the three devastating hurricanes of 2008, for example, children “were back in school the day after the storms had passed—whether classes were held in a home or a cafeteria. These children, even those temporarily housed in shelters, were back learning the next day…In the fantastic world of children, the tragedy loses some of its magnitude and it becomes almost a game once they recover their routine.” (www.medicc.org).

“I always say that applying the tenets of the Convention of the Rights of the Child isn’t a question of resources, but rather one of political will,” he suggested. “Cuba has demonstrated that a country doesn’t need to be rich to protect children’s rights. The Convention has been in place for 20 years and we’re still talking about hundreds of millions of children living in the street, not in school, or enslaved as laborers or sex workers, but not one of those children is Cuban and that’s due to the government’s political will to create a protective, rights-based environment.”

Education in Cuba

UNESCO’s “Education for All Global Monitoring Report” of 2005 gave Cuba high marks. Together with Canada, Finland and Korea, Cuba was singled out a “high-performance country and role model.” It was the only Latin American and relatively poor country to receive such recognition. Cuba spends 10 - 11 % of its GDP on education, tops in the world, with next highest Finland spending 6 percent. With 2% of the Latin America’s population, Cuba provides 11% of its scientists.

Education is mandatory in Cuba through the ninth grade, and is free of charge at all levels. There are now 45 Cuban universities, up from four in 1959. One of every 15 Cubans holds a university degree. There are 250,000 college and university students, taught by 25,000 professors. Presently, a system of television and computer assisted learning is available to students of all ages throughout the island.

In 1959, less than 0.5 percent of Cuban children graduated from high school. Urban illiteracy was 11.6 percent, rural illiteracy 41.7 percent. Joining the literacy campaign of 1961, 100,000 high school and college students taught reading and writing to illiterate people in rural and urban areas. Literacy rose to 97 percent within ten years and has recently remained at 98%.

Soon after 1959, 25,000 new schools were created, including schools for handicapped children. Now, of 9000 primary schools serving 823,000 students, 6,663 are in rural areas with 1500 of them attended by 5 or less students. Cuba’s pupil-to-teacher ratio is now 13.5 in primary school and 15 for all levels of education; 86.9% of students attend classes of less than 20.

According to UNESCO, Cuba "promotes the education of the whole individual (including physical, sports, and artistic development) while explicitly linking education with life, work and production."

Health Care for Children

The UN Children’s Agency (UNICEF) reported that in 2008 9.5 million children worldwide five years of age or younger died of “largely treatable and preventable causes.” By contrast, health outcome for Cuban children has steadily improved, as demonstrated by data over many years.

The infant mortality rate (IMR) represents the number of babies dying in their first year per 1000 births. Hovering at 60 or more during the 1950’s, Cuba’s IMR fell to 10.7 in 1991, 6.5 in 1999, 5.3 in 2007, and 4.8 in 2009. The overall U.S. IMR for 2008 was 6.3, although the IMR for African American was 13. Infant mortality worldwide was 52, that for Latin America, 26; West Africa, 108; Haiti, 84; and for industrialized nations generally, around five.

Life expectancy at birth in Cuba was 78.3 in 2007; in Canada, 80; USA, 78.2; China, 73; Haiti, 61, and in the world overall, 67.2. Maternal Mortality rates (number of women dying for every 100,000 births) for 2007 included Cuba’s at 21 along with rates for industrialized countries at 20, Latin America at 190, poor countries at 440, and all countries at 400.

Superior health care for Cuban children testifies to construction over decades of a health care system providing curative, preventative, and rehabilitative health care for all. From 3000 physicians practicing in Cuba in the early 1960’s, mostly in cities, their number had increased to 72,417 by 2007. The number of medical schools rose from one in 1961 to 23 at present. At 1/155, Cuba has more physicians per capita than any other nation. Comparable rates for Europe and the United States are 1/330 and1/417, respectively. Covering 99 percent of the population, almost 30,000 family doctor - nurse teams care for 500 – 1000 people in neighborhoods where the doctors live. While Cuba’s GDP dropped 35 percent between 1990 and 1998, the health care portion of the national budget rose from 7.4 percent to 13.1 percent.