The Chavista Intelligence Service interrogated for three hours Carlos Rosales, president of the Federation of Clinics, after he told journalists about the shortage of medical supplies in Venezuela. Numbers differ a lot according to whom you ask. Cristino García, president of the Federation of Nurses of Venezuela, said one out of four items you need to have at a hospital is not available. According to the vice-president of the Federation of Clinics, it's four out of five. That's quite a difference. The discrepancy has to do in part with the fact there is not one methodology to define what shortage of a product is in the case of hospitals and with the political position of the one being asked. But in any case: there are huge shortages. You just have to go to Venezuela and ask people about their experiences trying to find Paracetamol or products for blood pressure or the like.
Bear in mind this: since about 2004 Venezuelan hospitals and clinics are being regularly looted by part of its workers and by outsiders linked to those workers. The reasons are complex:
- public hospitals are now managed by people whose main qualification is to be loyal to the regime, nothing else
- the currency control that gives a preferential rate of an already overvalued currency to medical supplies make these resale of these goods even more profitable
- people don't earn enough with normal jobs
- the general social decay generated by an ever more corrupt country where there is no division of powers strengthens the process.
Maduro declared that the Día a Día supermarket chain will be taken over by PDVAL. This, of course, means more corruption and more power to the military controlling the chain.
Yesterday was a very sad day for Venezuelan democrats: Zapata, one of the best political cartoonists we had, passed away. He was 85. Here you have one of his last cartoons:
You can find out a little bit about his mood lately if you read his last tweets.
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| "There are only two types of people: those who think like me... and the traitors of the Fatherland" |
You can find out a little bit about his mood lately if you read his last tweets.
As a Colombian, I have to tell that with rare exception I have never cared for Venezuelans. I find them lazy, arrogant and downright stupid. That Venezuela is our "problem" and Latin America's "problem" cannot be denied. But why is that? Ecuador and Bolivia have similar left-leaning governments but enjoy much different results. They have food and have the cash to buy imported medicines and other necessities. Why can't Venezuela?
ReplyDeleteCorruption. Venezuela ranks 178th out of 190 countries in terms of corruption. Before Chávez it was the elite who stole. Now it's the military and the PSUV. Venezuelans want life on the dole. Generally I have immense empathy for Venezuelans who deserve better then I read the anti-Chávez blogs and realize why Venezuela is in the mess it is in. Yes the chavistas bear responsibility but so do many of those who now opposed chavismo. This is your mess. Not ours. You may be a problem for us but you're not our responsibility. A better title for your post would be: The Latin American Nation That Chose to "Auto-Suicidarse".
Your xenophobia couldn't be more pathetic.
DeleteVenezuelans are the main culprits of their own mess. Still, countries help each other. That was how Venezuelans received several million poor, mostly unskilled workers from Colombia. Venezuelans denounced publicly authoritarian regimes all over Latin America - for decades.
Now the authorities and lots of the elites of the neighbouring countries, including yours, decided to collude with an authoritarian regime to make money, a lot of money. That, Charles, is low.