Briefing

34% Of Healthcare Workers Haven’t Been Vaccinated

Healthcare workers demanded more vaccines and denounced the lack of information as state policy and the deaths in the sector. Oil minister and president of PDVSA Tareck El Aissami who assured long lines for gas will disappear soon because by the end of the year, they’ll quadruple oil production.

Naky Soto

Photo: AFP

  • Venezuela lacks information or a published vaccination plan:
    •  We have no vaccines and those who have gotten it are either powerful or simply got lucky, but so many citizens have been humiliated in long lines.
    • There isn’t a sole protocol to get any of the doses. 
    • On Father’s Day, they wouldn’t vaccinate because it was a “celebration” but sent the text message. 
    • On Sunday and Monday, people showed up at the Alba Caracas Hotel after getting the text message but were told that they had run out of vaccines and that they should come back in July. 
    • GNB officers oversee the vaccination process. Uncertainty, delays and confusion are also ways to humiliate people. 
  • Healthcare workers demanded more vaccines and denounced the lack of information as state policy and the deaths in the sector. “Not having the second dose is plain disrespect. We understand if there are delays, but what had been planned must be carried out,” said Jaime Lorenzo, president of Médicos Unidos de Venezuela. 
    • Union leader Zenaida Figuera assured that in other regions the situation is dire: “the cases are worse in Western Venezuela.” 
    • Ana Rosario Contreras, president of the Caracas Nurses Guild, called on workers of the sector to demand answers and a non-politicized vaccination plan: “We demand vaccines. Stopping the deaths is an emergency,” she said before she reminded everyone that over 600 workers have died. 

  • Bloomberg interviewed Oil minister and president of PDVSA Tareck El Aissami who assured long lines for gas will disappear soon because by the end of the year, they’ll quadruple oil production. 
    • According to him, there’s a lot of foreign investment coming. 
    • Professor Francisco Monaldi said that, if everything goes well, production could increase by 20%, to 600 thousand barrels per day, because of the higher prices. 
    • Economist Sergi Lanau commented on how unlikely it is to attract foreign investment or multiply production.
    • Bloomberg also reported that Maduro’s regime requested the Biden administration lift sanctions against them but they refused because chavismo hasn’t done enough to restore democracy. 
    • A spokesperson of the Department of State said that if they want a policy shift, Maduro must make “important changes”, like the commitment to solve the political crisis, paving the way for free and fair elections and restore economic and political freedoms. 
  • FundaRedes denounced that FARC dissidents murdered six Indigenous people because they raided a truck transporting food. 
  • A group of activists protested against hate crimes against the LGBTQAI+ community after a trans woman and a gay couple were murdered last week. 
  • Julio Borges, the Foreign commissioner of the caretaker government, asked the newly appointed Chief Prosecutor of the ICC Karim Khan, for celerity in the Venezuelan case. 
  • EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs Joseph Borrell announced he’s sending a technical mission to Venezuela, to evaluate if it’s possible to deploy a delegation for observation of the November elections. CNE rector Roberto Picón said this was “excellent news”. 
  • Delcy Rodríguez said she reviewed Venezuela’s economic relationship with Cuba and blamed the U.S. for the deterioration. 
  • Last night, Maduro announced he’s creating a new “special commission to reform the justice system” headed by Diosdado Cabello, Cilia Flores, and justice Lourdes Suárez, with which he’s promising “a profound judicial revolution”. 
  • Foreign minister Jorge Arreaza is still on tour in Russia. He had a meeting to go over the Russia-Venezuela agenda yesterday. He’ll meet with Serguei Lavrov today. 

Naky Soto

Naky gets called Naibet at home and at the bank. She coordinates training programs for an NGO. She collects moments and turns them into words. She has more stories than freckles.

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