CANADA PERSPECTIVE

Ottawa, July 4, 2026. One week after the twin earthquakes on June 24, the official toll stands at 2,645 dead and over 12,500 injured in Venezuela. Some 50,000 people remain missing. Rescuers are holding on to rare miracles: Hernán Alberto Gil Flores, 43, a security guard, was pulled alive after eight days under the rubble of a shopping center in La Guaira - freed by a three-meter tunnel dug by about 30 rescuers after more than 100 hours of continuous work.

Canada's government is monitoring two intertwined crises. The first is medical. Doctors fear the human toll will worsen in the coming weeks. "The problem we foresee is the infections that patients exposed to the disaster for the longest time may develop," says Eugenio Cova, head of traumatology at the del Oeste hospital in Caracas. Survivors are sleeping in overcrowded shelters or in the open, without access to drinking water, in heat that is conducive to vector-borne diseases. Véronique Durroux, UN-OCHA spokesperson for Latin America, finds the management of waste and debris "very concerning." The health crisis is exacerbated by the chronic shortage of Venezuelan doctors, a result of years of exodus and underfunding.

The second crisis is political. At her first press conference since the earthquake, interim Vice President Delcy Rodríguez defended the government's response, dismissing criticism as "propaganda." From Panama, María Corina Machado, Nobel Peace Prize laureate, demanded the right to return to Venezuela, citing "the total absence of the state" and claiming that "my presence stabilizes the situation." Her opposition movement has set up an online database listing 36,000 missing people and mobilized volunteers to collect donations within the diaspora.

Canada's coverage includes a national dimension: Arnaldo Dos Santos, a Vancouver resident stranded in Venezuela (expired passport, airport out of service), is distributing mattresses, blankets, and baby products because he cannot return home. "The number of tents, people sleeping on the ground because they have nothing left," he tells Global News. Gold Reserve Ltd., a TSX-listed company, has deployed $1 million to Samaritan's Purse, Catholic Relief Services, and World Vision, selected in coordination with the US embassy in Caracas. The US had also mobilized 900 military personnel on the ground to support relief operations.