Rescue teams in Venezuela have spent days searching for survivors after the most powerful earthquakes in more than a century struck the country on June 24. The official death toll has risen past 2,000, but tens of thousands of people remain unaccounted for, and the number of fatalities is expected to rise much higher. In the aftermath of this disaster, what are Venezuela’s most immediate and pressing needs? How well is the government of acting President Delcy Rodríguez responding and coordinating international aid? What dangers remain from damaged buildings and infrastructure, and how must they be addressed?
Gustavo Roosen, member of the Advisor board and president of IESA in Caracas: “It is still too early to assess the full extent of the devastation caused by the twin earthquakes. Venezuela’s most urgent needs are search-and-rescue operations, emergency medical care, temporary shelter, safe drinking water and the rapid restoration of electricity, communications and transportation. In response to the humanitarian crisis, acting President Delcy Rodríguez has formally requested U.S. humanitarian assistance, a request Washington has accepted. This effectively places the United States at the center of the logistical operation required to respond to the emergency. It also means that U.S. military personnel and Venezuela’s Bolivarian National Armed Forces will have to coordinate logistics and internal support operations. The task will be extraordinarily complex. The United States must work through an entrenched bureaucracy and severe institutional shortcomings resulting from years of poor governance: unreliable official information, excessive red tape, logistical constraints, shortages of heavy equipment, inadequate public services and corruption. Relief efforts must also be coordinated with 23 other countries already on the ground, with some 2,700 rescue personnel and international aid commitments totaling about $225 million. The challenge is enormous. According to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the number of missing persons could reach 50,000, while direct physical damage may approach $7 billion—about 7 percent of Venezuela’s current GDP.”
Jennifer Trivedi, associate professor in the Disaster Research Center at the University of Delaware: “In the aftermath of Venezuela’s dual earthquakes, the most pressing needs are the most basic of human needs: medical, food, water, information and comfort. Medical care is needed for all the injured. This also includes a need for mental health care, particularly in response to trauma. Those affected, who may not have access to their homes, need to eat. Water is needed not only for drinking, but also to ensure good sanitation practices. Sharing clear information in ways that people can access it when forms of communication may be down—including things like internet access, phone access or even word of mouth as communities are scattered across varied shelters and aid efforts—is critical. And, throughout all of this, people remain human; the need for care and comfort remains essential. Many people help others in disasters like this, including those on the ground and outside of the community. Providing funds to legitimate organizations aiding on the ground is one of the best ways to help from outside, ensuring they can get what people need to them in the best way possible. As rescue workers and residents continue the search for survivors, aftershocks continue. This means that throughout rescue and response efforts, people need to take steps to protect themselves from debris or unstable buildings, made more complex by existing earthquake damage. The declared state of emergency and damage from the earthquakes has also halted transportation in various ways, which may further complicate bringing in needed supplies.”
Jennapher Lunde Seefeldt, associate professor of government and international affairs at Augustana University: “As the days continue, rescue operations will turn into recovery missions, but the need for medical assistance will persist to overwhelm Venezuela’s health care infrastructure. The catastrophic earthquakes that struck in late June demonstrate how woefully insufficient emergency preparedness was, an outcome of the preceding decades’ worth of reductions to state investment in all forms of infrastructure. Buildings constructed without meeting code requirements remain a source of danger for civilians and rescuers. We will likely see increases in waterborne and communicable illnesses, given destroyed infrastructure that was already inadequate, and the overwhelmed health care systems will be forced to triage citizens and provide care in unsanitary and overcrowded conditions. Medicines and food were costly and of limited availability before the quakes, and those most burdened by the collapsed economy will face the worst outcomes of this disaster. Basic medical equipment is crucial in this immediate aftermath, and international assistance with humanitarian aid is paramount. Many neighboring Latin American countries have offered aid and assistance, along with larger global players including the United States, China and India. The challenge for Rodríguez will be in how she manages the distribution of the aid and utilizes the assistance offered. Popular support for Rodríguez was low before the earthquakes due to her nascent administration, political infighting and entrenched corruption, as well as perpetual economic turmoil. The United States will be the biggest presence in coordinating international aid and local organizations charged with resource distribution across the affected areas. Rodríguez faces a horrific test of her ability to govern, the success of which depends on an effective and efficient disaster response for her citizens.”
Katherine E. Bliss, senior fellow and director for immunizations and health systems resilience at the CSIS Global Health Policy Center: “With more than 2,000 deaths and many thousands more injured or missing, Venezuela’s search and rescue teams are rushing to find and treat survivors following earthquakes that damaged hundreds of buildings in the northern part of the country. But years of economic crisis, delayed infrastructure maintenance and a collapsed health system are stretching the capacity of emergency responders to meet the affected population’s needs. Inadequately staffed and poorly resourced hospitals, which had unreliable electricity and water supplies prior to the earthquakes, are now seeing an influx of wounded and traumatized people they are ill-equipped to treat. Acting President Delcy Rodríguez has declared a state of emergency, and Venezuela has received offers of financial support from the International Monetary Fund and medical supplies, as well as search and rescue resources, from more than 20 countries, including many in the region. The United States has suspended some sanctions to allow the government flexibility in responding to the crisis and has also deployed a disaster assistance response team to conduct a rapid needs assessment. But criticism that the Rodríguez administration’s coordination efforts are ineffective, politicized and obstructing international assistance has fueled public frustration over the response. While locating and treating earthquake victims must remain a priority, restoring transportation, communications and utilities is also critical. Given the economy’s dependence on the production of oil and petrochemicals, the continued lack of electricity at refineries and key ports means not only limited exports but also difficulties moving donated aid, supplies and services to communities in need.”
Juan Pablo Sarmiento, courtesy research professor at the Kimberly Green Latin American and Caribbean Center of Florida International University: “Hospitals in Venezuela are facing acute shortages of water, medicines and essential medical supplies, while several health care facilities have collapsed or sustained severe damage in the earthquakes. In many affected communities, the absence of heavy rescue equipment has compelled residents to search for survivors by hand. The response has been complicated by political polarization and competing information systems. Government and opposition authorities have released markedly different estimates of the missing and have established parallel humanitarian coordination mechanisms, reflecting limited public confidence in official data and response capacity. At the same time, an international relief effort is expanding, with specialized search-and-rescue teams deployed from several countries and additional humanitarian assistance—including medical support, logistics and emergency supplies—provided by regional and international partners. The structural risk remains critical. Thousands of buildings have reportedly been destroyed or severely damaged, while repeated aftershocks continue to threaten compromised structures. Given that a large proportion of Venezuela’s population resides in seismically vulnerable areas, rapid structural assessments by qualified engineers are essential before reoccupation. Immediate priorities remain search and rescue, emergency medical care, temporary shelter, restoration of critical infrastructure, and reliable situational assessment to guide response and recovery.”
Colette Capriles, professor in the Political and Social Sciences Academy at Universidad Simón Bolívar: “Natural catastrophes are not natural. They do not depend on human will, but they trigger human processes. The devastating June 24 earthquakes are a metaphor for the end of a political cycle, just as the deadly landslide of 1999 that affected the same area heralded a new authoritarian conception of military power and its role in public life. This immense tragedy amplifies the heavy burden left by Chavismo: while the government elite accumulated more power, the state, broken down, lost the capacity to fulfill its most elementary obligations. During the first 24 hours after the earthquakes, no plan, no strategy was put in place. The citizens’ orphanhood and desolation were exposed. Venezuelans reacted as they have for years, organizing themselves to survive. Although an emergency decree states that the commander of the National Guard will be the ‘sole authority’ for managing this crisis, the Rodríguez government has so far emphasized civilian control over operations, avoiding the 1999 military governance scheme of the disaster that resulted in human rights violations and severe social trauma. The Venezuelan military is cooperating with the U.S. mission. While calls for help persist on social media, there is still no official mechanism to verify information about victims or coordinate humanitarian aid. From the critical phase, in which the priority is to find survivors, we are already moving into the chronic phase: care for thousands of families who have lost their homes, and quantification of overall damages that could amount to 10 percent of GDP.”
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