Venezuela's Crisis Requires Full-Scale UN Action, Report Says
(Bloomberg) -- The worsening humanitarian crisis in Venezuela requires a full-scale United Nations response to address increasing levels of food insecurity and shortages of medicine, according to a new report.
The study published Thursday describes the spread of vaccine-preventable diseases, such as measles and diphtheria, rising infant mortality and sharp increases in the transmission of infectious diseases including malaria and tuberculosis. Child malnutrition is widespread, according to the report by researchers at Human Rights Watch and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
“Venezuela’s health system is in utter collapse,” according to researcher Shannon Doocy, an associate professor at Johns Hopkins who worked on the Venezuelan border and contributed to the study. “No matter how hard they try, Venezuelan authorities cannot hide the reality on the ground.”
Growing calls to step up humanitarian assistance to Venezuela come after months in which U.S. efforts to deliver aid were stymied by President Nicolas Maduro’s government, which has called the aid effort part of an American bid to overthrow his regime. Human rights and aid groups have decried the politicization of food and medicine aid as millions of Venezuelans suffer.
To address the growing problem, the report calls on UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to publicly declare that Venezuela is facing a “complex humanitarian crisis,” a move which would allow the world body to deploy its various agencies to provide more assistance to the Latin American nation. The report also called on Guterres to work to ensure Venezuelan authorities grant access to UN groups seeking to deliver humanitarian assistance.
International groups are increasingly seeking ways to bring aid to Venezuela through politically neutral channels. In late March, the Red Cross said it will begin distributing aid inside Venezuela to about 650,000 people. Maduro has sought to deny that Venezuela is beset by shortages and a broken health care system.
Michael R. Bloomberg, the founder of Bloomberg News parent company Bloomberg LP, is an alumnus and supporter of Johns Hopkins University.
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