Rudolf Virchow, a German doctor and one of the founders of social medicine, once stated, “Medicine is politics writ large.” In telling the story of the first Garifuna hospital, Revolutionary Medicine renders this wisdom both tangible and feasible. It should be required viewing for all medical students around the world. And for the rest of us, amongst the increasingly marginalized 99 percent, Revolutionary Medicine should rekindle the oft-forlorn hope of a better, fairer world, in the purest vision of Marx.
In an era in which 48 million Americans and half a million Canadians are living without health insurance, a time in which health has become a commodity, “Revolutionary Medicine-a story of the First Garifuna Hospital” is a fresh, tropical, breeze, pushing away the smog that most of us have come to accept as our realities.
Revolutionary Medicine, true to its title, is a provocative, 45-minute documentary by Beth Geglia, an independent, activist documentarian based in Washington D.C., and Jesse Freeston, a film maker based in Montreal, who had been a key member of the Real News Network.
Dr. Luther Harry Castillo, a Cuban-trained Garifuna doctor is our lively guide. He retraces the journey of the people of Ciriboya, a town in northeastern Honduras, to self-determination and empowerment, through the building of a community hospital. It is a heroic and inspiring struggle, told with intelligence, strength and humor, through the power of story, song and dance—and with an ever present historical context. The music of Aurelio Martinez and the Garifuna Soul Band provides the film’s ‘trilling wire.’
Honduras, the original ‘Banana Republic’ has struggled under the yoke of colonialism and imperialism for over five centuries. It holds the dubious distinction of being one the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere, as well as having the highest murder rate in the world.
The average life expectancy amongst poor Hondurans, is 52 years, with deaths due to respiratory illnesses and otherwise treatable medical conditions. Access to health care for most Hondurans is a challenge. For marginalized, remote communities such as the Garifuna, it has been a distant dream.
Enter Drs. Luther Harry Castillo, Wendy Lisseth, Perez Ventura and their colleagues in the ‘Luago Hatuadi Waduhenu Project’; their vision was to build the first Garifuna people’s hospital in Honduras.
“Over the years of discrimination and exclusion living in this country, we see that the majority of the population believe that black people are incapable of creating their own destiny. So we’ve raised our voices, not only in street protests, but also by bringing health care to the poorest communities. For us, this is a form of resistance,” said Castillo.
The Garufina descend from a group of West African slaves who escaped from a British slaveship off the coast of St Vincent in 1636. There, they rebuilt their lives, mixing with the Arawak and Carib indigenous peoples, giving rise to the unique and vibrant ethnocultural group known as the Garifuna or Garinagu. Similar to the Maroons of Jamiaca, the Garifuna resisted oppression and assimilation at the hands of European colonialists, actively battling slavery. As a result of their resistance, they were banished in 1797 to the island of Roatan, on the northern coast of present day Honduras.
The Garifuna established many communities in Honduras and Belize, based on traditional, sustainable agriculture and fishing, but have faced racism and exclusion by the central government and displacement from their traditional lands by multinational agribusiness. Since the 2009 U.S.-backed coup that toppled the democratically-elected president Manueal Zelaya, the Garifuna are now also being displaced by a burgeoning tourism industry, facilitated by an oppressive military-backed oligarchical regime that welcomes such foreign investment, while the vast majority of its people live in abject, worsening poverty.
The building of the hospital in Ciriboya was an authentic, grass-roots, community development project: the initial community meetings, the organized planning, the community defense committees, to the actual bricks, mortar and staffing. The viewer of Revolutionary Medicine is guided through the process in a series of compelling interviews with doctors, patients and community protagonists. Woven throughout is the irrepressible energy and vision of Dr. Castillo, whom like all his medical colleagues at the hospital, received his training at the Latin American School of Medicine in Havana, Cuba, a remarkable institution that has trained doctors from around the world, many of whom, like Castillo and his colleagues, were not born to parents ‘wearing white coats.’
The film eloquently probes topics such as the roots of oppression and the tragedy of acceptance of oppression as the norm, by the oppressed. For the Garifuna, this includes being excluded from the minimal democracy that exists in Honduras as a radicalized minority. It also includes the acceptance of a life expectancy decades below the western norm.
The film also makes the critical distinction between public and private health care. However, the hospital in Ciriboya is neither, receiving no funding from the Honduran government. Its doctors do not aspire to wealthy, elite lives apart from the communities they serve, as do many of their colleagues in the North. Furthermore, because the community ‘owns’ the hospital, there is accountability at all levels of care.
The effectiveness of the health care provided by the hospital in Ciriboya comes in part because it is administered by health care providers who live within and are part of the community they serve. It is a compelling model that speaks to the waning concept of ‘doctor-patient’ rather than ‘doctor-client’ relationship. In a world dominated by neoliberal approaches to health care and health that deny the inherent right of citizens to both, the Ciriboya project is both refreshing and inspiring.
Through the voices of Dr. Castilo and the Garifuna, the viewer is guided to a vision of Revolutionary Medicine that equal and unimpeded access to community-led health care is revolutionary, and that doctors and their patients should be part of this revolution. Whether the enemy is government oppression, or the tyranny of neoliberalism, a healthy, empowered citizenry is requisite to start the march towards a new, humane world order. Moreover, doctors by sharing their power should be active participants in this process.
“We believe in the accelerating march toward a new country, with a new constitution that reflects the rainbow of different faces in this country, the indigenous, the blacks, the workers, the farmers, the unionists, the professionals, that they are all recognized,” said Castillo during the March of 214 Drums protest in Tegucigalpa.
Rudolf Virchow, a German doctor and one of the founders of social medicine, once stated, “Medicine is politics writ large.” In telling the story of the first Garifuna hospital, Revolutionary Medicine renders this wisdom both tangible and feasible. It should be required viewing for all medical students around the world. And for the rest of us, amongst the increasingly marginalized 99 percent, Revolutionary Medicine should rekindle the oft-forlorn hope of a better, fairer world, in the purest vision of Marx.
For more information about the film visit: http://revolutionarymedicine.org/