Today, we started off the day lecture from Dr. Florencia from ASEConecta. This was a really great lesson that showed us the true impact of Milei and his reforms on the healthcare system, specifically the unions. She talked about the difference between Medife, which is a pre-paid health insurance company and ASE, which is an Obras Sociales. Due to the recent reforms, ASE has been removed from the equation to eliminate the middle man. This makes worker contribute directly to insurance companies instead of going through the unions first. She talked about how in the next few years she sees unions no longer being a thing. Last week, we heard that the unions being no longer could be a great possibility in the future but actually seeing it start to happen to smaller unions is eye- opening. After this, we went back to the hotel to have a quick lunch. We than went to visit a private cardiac hospital, ICBA. This hospital specializes in only cardiac procedures. They are owned by Swiss Medical, but work and run independent from them. Their main focus is to get patients in and out in one day without the need for hospitalization. They are I found it really interesting that 66% of nurses at this hospital have their BSN since the country average is 11%. One of the nurses we spoke with said that the hospital really pushed for him to get his BSN and supported him through it.

Our prompt for today was to write about what it was like to see the difference between the resources at a private vs public hospital. Today’s hospital we went to offered a level of service and comfort that seemed like a luxury let alone the looks of the facility. It was sad to see the complete opposites of ICBA and Paroissien Hospital of La Manzana. The infrastructures of the two buildings couldn’t be more different. ICBA was fully modernized and structurally up to date while La Manzana needed a lot of repairs that were necessary for a safe and sanitary hospital, not including the fully outdated building. La Manzana had equipment that was outdated and functionally but not to the extent that ICBA was. They had high-tech machines and equipment that allows them to perform advanced but minimally invasive surgery. There was even a difference in the chairs in the waiting rooms and patient facilities. The resources available in the hospitals was also very interesting to see. ICBA was fully stocked with all the supplies they would need and more while La Manzana barely had enough resources to function properly. After seeing ICBA, it was really upsetting to see the how well ICBA was functioning and how happy people seemed to be there and work there because when we visited La Manzana many workers seemed stressed and looked like they had to work a lot harder with the little they were given.