CARACAS. While the window of life is closing, 10 days after the two earthquakes that hit Venezuela, relatives are protesting in the devastated areas, mainly in the state of La Guaira because they believe that search and rescue efforts cannot yet be paralyzed.
Thousands of people remain under the rubble of the buildings that collapsed and, according to the interim account, today, Saturday, July 4, 2,954 people died and 16,692 were injured.
These figures, not credible, have created chaos in both morgues and hospitals in Venezuela.
Towards La Guaira, the hearses travel in a caravan while, in the improvised morgue in the silos of the port of La Guaira, the delivery of the bodies is done slowly. Relatives wait hours to remove the bodies of their loved ones, some cannot be recognized.
The region is becoming empty. Several rescue groups, having complied with international protocols, have returned to their countries, including the famous Moles of Mexico. However, first responders from the United States will remain in Venezuela for a while longer, as will those from El Salvador.
The withdrawal of these rescue brigades is a blow to the families of the victims who are still desperately fighting to find their relatives.
It is a coming and going, of hospitals, shelters and morgues. Search lists of injured and missing.
Rescues
After the rescue of Hernán Gil, in La Guaira, after remaining trapped in tons of concrete for eight days, there has not been another rescue of any survivor, until now.
Meanwhile, in the Caraballeda sector, the family of Fabio, a 9-year-old boy trapped under the rubble of his building, felt that their son was still alive, and his father, Francisco Bastardo, said he has not lost hope that “he will appear.”
Restart of classes
The Ministry of Education announced that classes will resume starting next Monday, July 6, in unaffected areas, while they will remain suspended in the sectors hit by the earthquakes.
The Education portfolio also ordered the incorporation of risk management as a topic of study. It was also expected that the authorities would announce economic measures, which did not happen.
It has not been reported whether an inspection was carried out at the schools in the “unaffected” areas. In Caracas a third of the schools were damaged.
The health emergency
Not only the World Health Organization has warned about the possibility of a health emergency breaking out in Venezuela, after the two earthquakes that severely hit the Caribbean country.
The director of Project HOPE in Venezuela, Carolina de Jesús, summarized for CNN what her teams see in hospitals and communities after the powerful earthquakes.
“In the affected areas, the outlook is one of total desolation,” he said, while stating that the catastrophe has tested a health system that has been in a long crisis due to years of deterioration and lack of investment.
He pointed out that in La Guaira the system was left out in a matter of hours. “Local health networks are collapsing due to the avalanche of patients. Small health centers are completely overwhelmed.”
In addition, he pointed out that in several centers medical personnel care for patients on the ground due to lack of beds, while injured people continue to arrive and the aftershocks do not stop.
The pressure on the system has even led to improvised solutions in the coastal city. A fast food establishment was converted into a hospital and veterinary clinic, where volunteer doctors treat hundreds of patients a day with donated medicines and consultations, including some emergency procedures, are carried out in precarious conditions.
Saturated, overwhelmed, evacuated and restricted
The seismic doublet also caused damage to some health centers in the affected areas.
After the earthquakes, the affected hospitals include:
José María Vargas (La Guaira)
Domingo Luciani (Greater Caracas- Miranda)
Miguel Pérez Carreño (Caracas)
Catia Peripheral (Caracas)
Magallanes (Caracas)
Carlos Arvelo (Military Hospital- Caracas)
M. de Los Ríos (Children’s Hospital- Caracas)
El Ávila Clinic (Private- Caracas)
Children’s Hospital and The Sea (La Guaira)
Farewell on the beach
Leonardo Suárez is a man who lost his mother, wife, two daughters, a nephew and his wife’s grandmother in this tragedy. He cries profusely and only manages to say: “This is very difficult.” He carries in his hands the small wooden boxes where the ashes of his relatives rest.
Suárez was accompanied by relatives and neighbors for the farewell of his deceased on the beach. They will all stay in La Guaira, on the beach where their mother managed a family kiosk.
