By Ruth Lara Castillo.
Alfredo Caceres, the coordinator of the transplant patients organization in Carabobo, denounced on July 27 that there are failures in the supply of drugs necessary for people with transplants organs in the country. To date, there have been 18 deaths so far in 2020 due to this cause.
According to Caceres, there is a shortage of drugs for more than a year, a deadly risk for patients. Some of them, already beginning to present organ rejection.
“There are 18 deaths due to lack of drugs, that is essential, of these 18 there are three people with presumed COVID-19, but they presented rejection of their transplant. We have serious failures with the Tracolimus, which has not arrived for a year, others for five, six, and seven months,” said the spokesperson for the organization.
We don´t want to die
People with organ transplants expressed their concern to the El Pitazo. They said that the Venezuelan Institute of Social Security (Ivss) in Naguanagua does not have the medicines, and its workers do not provide answers to the request.
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Esperanza Lusinchi indicated that she urgently needs the Tracolimus. “My husband, Luis Lusinchi, had a kidney transplant 15 years ago. His son, Luis Alexander, was the donor, and it is so sad that after so much effort and work, there is no medicine. Please, help us, we need the medicine”.
Pro-Maduro governor in Caracabo, Rafael Lacava, should get involved in the case and use his influences with the regime, another patient suggested.
“Mr. Governor Lacava, we need the immunosuppressants, the Tracolimus is an anti-rejection medicine that we did not receive from the high-cost Ivss pharmacy since ten months ago. There are several transplant patients at risk and others who died. We know you were a kidney patient, so we appreciate your efforts,” claim another transplant patient.
Those affected are asking for speed in the delivery of medicines. These products are available in private pharmacies, but prices are very high, and some people do not have the financial resources to pay for their treatment.
“We have received the Mycophenolate, but we require Prednisone and Tracolimus, which we have not received for a year, and we are waiting for what will happen to our organ. We need to get this drug, in the private pharmacies it is too expensive, and with what we earn, we will never be able to get this drug in our lifetime,” said Xiquiu Rodriguez.
Marianny Escalona expressed her anguish because she wants to take care of the kidney that she received four years ago. “Please we need you to take action to face the lack of medicine for transplant patients, we have a year without receiving vital medicine for my kidney…please…we don’t want to die, nor return to dialysis.”