Decades of neglect for the country’s healthcare system have left medics improvising as they treat victims of Wednesday’s earthquake devastation, a Venezuelan doctor warned.
“The Venezuelan healthcare system has declined progressively,” Dr. Huníades Urbina-Medina, a pediatrician and former president of Venezuela’s National Medicine Academy, told CNN.
The doctor and his colleagues have been alerting officials about this “decay” since the 1998 electoral victory of Hugo Chávez, he said.
The healthcare professional said people are flocking to hospitals where they are being treated in corridors — and where medical workers are improvising because they do not have access to the necessary resources.
“There is no way to care for them,” Urbina-Medina said. “We have no medical gases, analgesics, anaesthetics or antibiotics.”
The veteran doctor said Venezuela has faced years of shortages in everything from beds to painkillers to disposable gowns, and patients are sometimes requested to purchase their own supplies ahead of surgery.
Urbina-Medina said only proper investment can help avert healthcare shortfalls in the event of another seismic catastrophe in the future. “We need to prepare hospitals,” he said. “Renovate them according to international standards, and stock supplies for at least 72 hours.”
