JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
The death toll from Venezuela's devastating earthquakes continues to climb, with the government currently confirming at least 900 people have been killed, more than 3,000 people injured. Rescue teams from around the world are joining the search for survivors as hospitals struggle to cope and the military takes control of one of the hardest-hit regions. And in neighboring Colombia, home to the largest Venezuelan diaspora, communities are rallying to send aid. Manuel Rueda is at a community center in Bogota where Venezuelans are gathering supplies for people back home. Hi there.
MANUEL RUEDA, BYLINE: Hi there.
SUMMERS: So it sounds pretty busy where you are. And I want to talk about the assistance being offered, but before we do, I want to ask, what do we know about the ongoing rescue efforts in Venezuela?
RUEDA: So it's a slow rescue effort because of the lack of capabilities that the Venezuelan government has for a disaster like this. They've been relying heavily on teams from other countries, rescue workers and rescue equipment from other countries coming in as well. And one of the problems is that the airport in La Guaira, the city that has been hardest hit by the earthquake, is damaged. The runway - one of the runways is damaged. So they're actually flying people and equipment to a military airport that's about 3 hours away, and then, you know, they have to drive all the way.
On the road, some people are stopping these trucks and asking for help. Like, maybe if the truck is destined to a neighborhood further away, they try to stop it before because people are so desperate for help because there's still many people trapped in the buildings that have collapsed, which are pretty big buildings. I mean, some of these were 10-story buildings. Some of these were public housing projects. So it's still quite a chaotic situation.
SUMMERS: You are at a community center in Bogota. What are you hearing from people there? What have you - what are people telling you about their loved ones?
RUEDA: Yeah, there's hundreds of people here, and what they're doing is that they're bringing nonperishable foods. They're bringing medical supplies, for example, gloves or bandages or face masks. They're even bringing clothes. You know, just a massive outpouring of support. They're loading a truck right now. It has six rows of wheels, so it's a pretty big truck. For the people here, you know, this is a very personal tragedy. This is what Mariana Godoy, one of the volunteers here, told me.
MARIANA GODOY: (Speaking Spanish).
RUEDA: So she's saying she has a relative who's a doctor in Caracas who couldn't stay in his apartment after the earthquake because the building was - sustained structural damage. So this doctor has been sleeping with his family in his office in the clinic...
SUMMERS: Wow.
RUEDA: ...Because he just can't go back home. So what, you know, aid groups are expecting is a lot of homeless people in the following days sleeping outside, sleeping in parks. And that's why, you know, these efforts to take goods for basic survival - the clothes, the drinking water, the food - that's why these things are important, because the Venezuelan government doesn't have the capacity to supply all of those things on its own.
SUMMERS: And how does Venezuela's broader economic and political crisis affect the emergency response and recovery happening on the ground?
RUEDA: Well, you know, hospitals in Venezuela have been in very bad shape for the past 10 years. Venezuela is a country where if you need a surgery, you have to bring your own supplies for the doctors to do it. So this is going to be - they're going to need a lot of help boosting the hospital system now with so many people coming into emergency rooms.
And they're also going to need help with their finances. Venezuela has foreign debt of about $240 billion, which is twice its annual GDP. So you start - they're going to need help from banks to roll over some of that debt so that they can spend their income, their income that comes from oil mostly, on rebuilding the country. They're also going to have to set up favorable conditions for companies and governments to help with the rebuilding process.
SUMMERS: Manuel Rueda in Bogota, Colombia, thanks so much.
RUEDA: Absolutely. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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