Turkey’s Health Minister Fahrettin Koca announced late Monday that the number of the confirmed coronavirus cases in Turkey rose to 47 in six days following the first confirmed case.
Pointing at the capitalist world’s inability of creating solutions to the pandemic, the Communist Party of Turkey released a 12-point declaration regarding the worldwide coronavirus outbreak, showing how socialism would provide pro-people practices. The declaration intends to compare how socialism would react to such a pandemic with the incompetent situation of the states today.
The full statement is as follows:
The capitalist world and Turkey are sliding into a desperate chaos against the novel coronavirus outbreak. We are not doomed to this situation. In socialist Turkey, the outbreak would be brought under control easily and prevented from turning into a social disaster for the workers.
But how? In this way;
1. All the private hospitals and institutions would be nationalized.
Today, the state is functioning with half-power because most of the medical institutions are private. Even the state hospitals have been restructured for market-oriented profits. The first task would be to nationalize and reorganize all of them on the basis of pro-people principles to serve for the struggle against the outbreak.
2. The banks, the industrial plants and the service sector would also be nationalized.
These nationalization practices would largely enhance the state power in the struggle against the outbreak. Today, the capital-oriented government is busy with cutting off the public expenditures to transfer the resources to the crisis of the bosses. Under current circumstances, however, all the resources should have been used for developing and protecting the public health.
3. The nationalization practices would enable central planning.
Central planning means the political will of the working people. This is the only way to cope with a social problem in a rational way by use of every means available. In addition to the production, the cities, the public spaces and the transportation would be on the agenda of the planning.
4. Institutes would be established immediately for vaccination, treatment and the criteria of diagnosis against the coronavirus.
Turkey can neither produce vaccination nor medicines for treatment. To what extent the criteria of diagnosis is functioning properly is doubtful, and it has been impossible to receive reliable information in this respect so far. One of the initial affairs of the socialist Turkey would be to gather the scientists to focus on this task in institutes where rapid developments would be provided.
5. Health services would be completely free of charge.
All the people would have free health services. Everyone would unconditionally be under social security. Masks and disinfectants against the outbreak would be provided free of charge. Access to health services would be provided not only in medical institutions but also in neighborhoods, schools, and workplaces.
6. Religion and state affairs would be separated.
In socialist Turkey, the Directorate of Religious Affairs (Diyanet) would not have an effect on decision-making processes. The people returning from the Umrah pilgrimage would be put in quarantine healthily, the students would not be evacuated from their dormitories at midnight.
7. The implementation of quarantine would not be arbitrary but a compulsory social task.
The implementation of quarantine, the most efficient method against the outbreak, would not be arbitrary for the people, it would be a compulsory and accurate practice as a social task.
8. The media would be reorganized in a way to broadcast the truths to the public.
The media would not be a trumpet of the ruling power, it would be reorganized for enabling the people to reach true information. Therefore, the people could reach reliable information with regards to the prevalence of the outbreak.
9. The plundering of the markets and stockpiling would not be allowed.
The people have emptied the shelves to stock food and health materials since they do not trust in the state against the outbreak. In socialist Turkey, however, the shares of everyone would be guaranteed and delivered even under severe conditions. Stockpiling would not be allowed.
10. Economic crises would not emerge.
There would be no bankruptcies since the nationalized enterprises would not seek profit. There would be no dismissals because of bankruptcies and the bosses’ greed for profit.
11. Selfishness would be condemned, the spirit of sharing and solidarity would prevail.
The conscious people of the socialist society would initially care about the individuals in need of protection, and mobilize altogether to meet their needs in such states of emergency. The measures would rapidly prevail over the conscious society, and the current eclipse of reason would not be experienced.
12. A socialist society would be hopeful.
It would be possible to talk about a confident and cold-minded society that trusts in science and the future against such challenges instead of a mental state of panic, helplessness and hopelessness led by the coronavirus.
Once again, we can see the importance of all these facts in these current days of outbreak. We believe that humanity will overcome these days. Humanity will stand out with and only with these values.
The Communist Party of Turkey calls for such a social order.
