Thousands of displaced Venezuelans are sleeping in crowded shelters or outside without access to clean water amid dismal sanitary conditions following the June 24 earthquakes, which officials say killed at least 2,295 and left more than 11,000 injured.
Aid workers have warned that the aftermath of the earthquakes has developed into a major medical crisis that, unless quickly brought under control, will claim more lives in the coming days and weeks. The emergency has exposed Venezuela's chronic shortage of doctors, the result of years of economic crisis, underfunding, and emigration.
“The issue we foresee just around the corner is the infections that patients who have been exposed to the disaster for the longest time might bring,” said Eugenio Cova, the head of the trauma unit at Hospital del Oeste Dr José Gregorio Hernández in Caracas, the capital. “We’ve already gone through a period of complex trauma, which will continue to occur, but now it’s complicated by infections."
Aid workers also warn that extensive damage to infrastructure could fuel disease outbreaks in the hardest-hit communities.
“It’s very hot, and there’s a lot of concern about potential vector-borne diseases,” said Veronique Durroux, the U.N. humanitarian agency spokesperson for Latin America and the Caribbean. “Waste management is an issue. Debris management, when you see the scale of devastation, it’s very concerning.”
