CARACAS, (Reuters) – Venezuelans with chronic medical conditions such as breast cancer, haemophilia and transplants protested in Caracas yesterday, the latest demonstration to demand urgent medicines in a country whose health care system is beset with shortages.
Around 13,000 people with chronic issues are at risk of severe harm if they do not take medicines including chemotherapy and medicines to prevent organ transplants being rejected, according to organizer CodeVida, a non-profit umbrella health group.
A combination of currency controls, slumping domestic production and cross-border smuggling have caused acute shortages of medical supplies in socialist-led Venezuela. With an estimated seven in 10 drugs currently unavailable, rights groups are warning the situation is increasingly untenable.
“The word ‘wait’ doesn’t exist for transplant patients. The medicines are daily. If we don’t have them, we collapse,” said Alfredo Quintero, 52, who has a transplanted kidney but has medicines to last only until Sept. 6.
“What do they want us to be, a statistic?” he said at the demonstration of a few dozen protesters outside a social security’s pharmaceutical branch meant to supply free medicines.
