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At the 40 th independence year, Mauritius achievements were especially in the economic area but there were also many other reasons for celebration. Among these Mauritius achievements we can mention the life expectancy, which increased while the infant mortality has kept on falling since the ‘60s. Still, the health system is challenged by the chronic diseases and by drugs.
The Mauritius achievements were seen as very hard to get with more than 40 years ago, when the island became independent of British. This Indian Ocean island’s prospects seemed few at that time, since the island was depending on the workers’ remittances and on the sugar cane.
The chances of giving away the poverty seemed little by two winners of the Nobel prizes.
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A specialist in economics at the Cambridge University, James Meade also said that finding employment for the island’s increasing population will be an important part of the Mauritius achievements. This happened in the ’60s when V S Naipaul, an author, said that Mauritius is an ‘overcrowded barracoon’ and that the problems of the island defy the solutions. But Mauritius achievements were registered in health system, the freedom of the media, in education, competitiveness, progress, growth and of course, economics. The chief medical officer of Mauritius, Neerunjun Gopee, had a comment in Mauritius Time about the book written by Naipaul. In his columns, he said that Mauritius is called by Naipaul the disaster island and wonders if to get rid of diseases like malaria can be called disaster. The author of the articles says that for Naipaul can be because the result was the overpopulation’s increase at over 1.000 inhabitants on a square mile.
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The people of the island see things in other way. They are proud of Mauritius achievements, even if they are small ones. Among the Mauritius achievements in the health area are also the disappearing of other diseases like: meals, polio, schistosomiasis, smallpox, diphtheria and whooping cough. The people of this island also now that there are many other challenges their country has to manage. The foreign tourists see Mauritius as a paradise full of sun and idyllic atmosphere but poverty still affects some people despite the fact that the income risen from $200 per person in the independence year to about $7000 now. The unemployment rate was around 40% in the ’60s when the people of Mauritius used to go and work abroad, especially to have nurse training in Britain. Now, the Mauritians work home where the jobs can be found easier and the unemployment rate is around 8% once the government’s investments in textiles, tourism, outsourcing and offshore banking. The national budget considers health as a basic human right and as a priority but some future Mauritius achievements will be necessary in the heath area regarding diseases like avian influenza and HIV/AIDS and the drug addiction. The budget for the health area increased from 9 million rupees in 1968 to 4.4 billion rupees in 2008, which is also on the list of the Mauritius achievements.
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