Alarm over the number of Venezuelan military dead from COVID-19 without medical care or in temporary hospitals

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The announcements of the death of men who have served the military institution in Venezuela are disturbing. Most shameful is the discrimination suffered by those who do not have access to power in Venezuela. The indignation, alarm and fear is shown by many military men in the barracks and through WhatsApp or Facebook chats.

Among the military who have died from COVID-19 are Generals (Ej) Juan Manuel Bogado Velásquez, (GN) Julio Rafael Lara Guzmán, (Av) Óscar Córdoba Guedez, (Av) Alberto Enrique Rivas Peña, (Av) Wilson Marín Meza; GB Pacheco Melgarejo died at the Domingo Luciano hospital. Vice Admiral Hernán Gruber Odremán, Colonels (Ej) José Luis Ramírez Aranda, (Ej) Gabriel Duque Vivas, Captain Sánchez Correa.

Colonel (GNB) Hendrik Otoniel Montañez, director of the Military Circle in Lara, is also on the list. As is Col. Richard Solórzano Barreto, who was commander of the National Police in Carabobo.

“Major (Ej) José Alberto Álvarez Guerrero died due to COVID-19, in the Poliedro of Caracas, his relatives went to look for his body and found him with the unpleasant surprise that he was put inside an unidentified black bag, together with other deceased also unidentified; his relatives could not remove his remains,” the message from a military officer.

Another message reads: “Tcnel Cruz Manuel Contreras Dionicie, Commander of the 332nd Caribbean Battalion “Tcnel Juan Ignacio Rendón Blanco” presented general malaise and fever, and was transferred to the General Hospital “Dr. Felipe Guevara Rojas”, in El Tigre, Anzoátegui state”, he presented symptoms associated to Covid and died shortly after.

“We need help for XXX promotion XXX, who is in delicate situation due to the Chinese virus and you can help by depositing in the bank, account XX or via Zelle United States, to email XXX. It is a basic home treatment of 2,000 dollars so that the lungs return to their normal level and get out of the crisis”, example of some of the messages that roam in the military chats.

A military indicates that when they arrive at the small hospital or the Military Hospital and the diagnosis of the virus is positive “they immediately send them to the polyhedron and then they forget about them. There begins the ordeal for the relatives, starting with the purchase of medicines, the patient must buy 6 ampoules of Remdesivir and each one is in the order of US$200, a total of US$1,200. Some will be able to buy them, but most cannot and are left to the hand of God”.

Doctor and Colonel Angel Sanchez Meneses, who was attending in an Iorfan office inside the Military Hospital, called the Center of Attention to the Affiliated (CAICA), due to his daily contact with asymptomatic retired military patients, contracted COVID-19 and died on March 14, 2021. Now, Tcnel Jhon Montiel is in charge of attending to the Iorfan Affiliates who require attention at the Dr. Carlos Arvelo military hospital, as well as the extension of medication requests, laboratory exams, etc.

The FIM claims

“Military retirees and the civilian population have had to resort to collections of money and sanitary material to treat covid-19 patients, which in many cases the costs exceed the availability of existing resources. The situation of the active reserve military is one of true orphanhood and abandonment on the part of the military authorities who have the duty to watch over their health and welfare rights, achieved through time and the dedication of the best years of their lives to the service of the homeland”.

This is what the Military Institutional Front (FIM) denounces, in view of what is already a tragedy with the number of requests for help from relatives, friends and colleagues of military personnel affected by Covid-19 in Venezuela, which has become constant, either for medicines or even to be accepted in sentinel hospitals or assistance centers when the tests indicate that they are infected by the virus.

The FIM emphasizes that “the succession of recent deaths of distinguished comrades in arms, including members of their families, both active and retired, associated with the lethal virus is really alarming and incomprehensible”, says the organization which groups more than two hundred military personnel in active reserve of the various components of the Armed Forces.

As they explain, relatives of military personnel infected with Covid-19 “have reported that they were not admitted to the military hospital system, in spite of their seriousness, being referred to general and field hospitals which did not meet the essential conditions or intensive care for their treatment and recovery”.

They denounced that “in Venezuela the sacrifice of people is taking place as a result of the lack of a robust and efficient public health system, and the lack of clear and reliable official policies for the care of the hundreds of sick people infected during the COVID-19 pandemic”.

The warlike discourse

The FIM is an organization led by Admiral Huizi Clavier, together with former Ministers of Defense, such as Major General (Ej) Fernando Ochoa Antich and Major General (Ej) Rafael Montero Revette, as well as former general commanders of various components, among them Major General (Av) Maximiliano Hernández Vásquez, Major General (Ej) Carlos Julio Peñaloza, Vice Admiral Jesús Enrique Briceño García, among others.

They stressed that “what is happening in our country fills us all with deep pain and indignation; it is not possible that in the face of this tragedy that affects us, there has been no reaction from the Minister of Defense or the high authorities of the National Armed Forces. On the contrary, the regime politicizes the serious health situation of the country, hides the true reality, alters figures and engages in a sort of competition for who brings more vaccines and from where”.

They confessed to witness with astonishment “the warlike manifestations of the Minister of Defense and the Military High Command and their stubbornness in imposing an epic and narrative to show the warlike capacity of the Armed Forces in very painful moments and circumstances for the country and without considering that the priority today must be focused on attending to the precarious and urgent health situation”.

They concluded by making a call “to the conscience of those who have the duty to react to the health catastrophe, of our active comrades in arms so that, hearing not the voice, but the cry of those who have lost some of their loved ones and who cry out for life, to comply with their constitutional duties in the face of the tragedy that tears our hearts”.

Source: Infobae