Many people appeal to international donations, for which many NGOs have been mobilized, to exchange or purchase medicines on the black market as alternatives. The NGO “A Medicine for Venezuela” is one of those organizations that collects medicines to help patients trapped without treatment. The organization sends the medicines through local companies that must draw a series of obstacles at the end of which is SENIAT, the Venezuelan customs authority. It prohibits private transportation of medicines and food, in addition to prohibiting corruption in customs. Once the numerous barriers are overcome, the help network must be careful not to attract attention to large storage areas for pain medicines as a they may be accused of hoarding drugs or contraband. The Venezuelan NGO “Codevida” oversees the distribution on the ground by means of a telephone drugstore. The pharmacy went from receiving 300 calls a month in 2016 to 5,000 this year. Codevida gathers information on the most demanded medicines, including those needed for organ transplant operations, analgesics for terminals, drugs for multiple sclerosis, hepatitis. In the process, there is a base of 30 fixed volunteers who manage the donations, most of which are processed by the Facebook page or with contributions from laboratories and pharmacies.

The experts of the Venezuelan Society of Cardiology have coordinated a survey about the 43 main health centers of focused on the endowment to treat cardiovascular diseases. 75% of hospitals had no aspirin, an essential drug for the treatment of heart disease. Patients with heart attacks are being treated as they were 40 years ago, when the incidence of deaths for this reason reached 15%. The government has not released mortality figures since 2013. That makes it difficult to know the real dimensions of the crisis.

For the survey 23 hospitals in the capital of each state, university hospitals, 371 public and private hospitals, 92 hospitals Type II, Type III, Type IV (large hospitals) were considered. Around 97% of the country’s public health laboratories had shortage of reagents to perform the medical tests. This implies that patients were forced to go private laboratories to perform their medical tests.

Out of pocket pay decreased from 81% in 2016 to 75% in 2017. Around 64% of the pediatric wards in the hospitals had shortage of milk formulas while the same percentage of kitchens of public hospitals were not operational because of no food supplies.

The survey also revealed that 89% of X-ray equipment is either non-operational or intermittent, 71% of hospitals do not have working ultrasound equipment and 94% of CT scans are not functional.

On the contrary, private sector hospitals have 100% of beds and operating rooms in working condition. The private sector treats 55% of Venezuelans. The country has been experiencing medicine shortage for over two years. Physicians and representatives of the public health sector have repeatedly condemned the infrastructure conditions of hospitals, the lack of medicines, as well as the shortage of medical supplies.