ABSTRACT
The American continent is highly urbanized and inequitable, across and within countries. The United States of America (USA) is the largest world economy, with a 2017 per capita income of US$52,000, while at the other end of the spectrum Haiti has a per capita income of about US$800. The average life expectancy is seventy-five years, ranging from sixty-three years in Haiti to 81.6 years in Canada. The infant mortality rate for the region is 18.6 per 1,000 live births. Access to health care is considered a right in most Latin American countries. Chile was the first to have a National Health System in the mid-1950s; Cuba developed its comprehensive health care system after the 1959 revolution, and the Medical Care Act was approved in Canada in 1966. The economic crisis of the 1980s resulted in many Latin American governments having to rely on external financing to pay the external debt and maintain basic public services.
