Nine years without transplants in Venezuela, health crisis deepens

Nine years have passed since Venezuela suspended its organ transplant program, marking a somber anniversary for the nation's ailing healthcare system. What began in 2017 as a three-month provisional measure by the Venezuelan Foundation for Organ and Tissue Donation and Transplants (Fundavene) to address issues with immunosuppressant drug supply has evolved into a decade-long structural paralysis.

The NGO Prepara Familia is urgently demanding that the reactivation of transplants and dialysis units be prioritized in political discussions about the country's reinstitutionalization. The organization stresses that before operating rooms can reopen, significant structural investment is needed in a fragmented and severely deteriorated health system.

Prepara Familia's demands include guaranteeing basic hospital services like water, electricity, and functional labs and ambulances. They also call for the reopening of critical closed specialties, such as Cardiology and Neurology, at reference centers like the J. M. de los Ríos Hospital. Furthermore, the NGO emphasizes the need to offer competitive salaries and dignified conditions for medical personnel to halt the mass migration of specialists, particularly in Nephrology, and to train specialized nursing staff.

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The damage is irreparable, the result of all this is death.

The organization also highlights the critical situation for pediatric patients, noting that living-donor transplants, the only active modality, are almost exclusively for adults. Children lacking compatible relatives are left without options. Prepara Familia also points to the devastating emotional toll on caregivers, with 85% of mothers and grandmothers reporting distress and constant worry due to hospital supply shortages.

"The damage is irreparable, the result of all this is death," warned Judith Bront, a representative from Prepara Familia. She emphasized that patients deserve a chance at a quality life, free from the deficiencies they have endured for so long. The lack of essential services and specialized care has left countless individuals, especially children, in a dire state, with many succumbing to their conditions.

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These children and adults who are with a pathology have already experienced enough deficiencies during this time and deserve to have a new opportunity to live with quality of life.