The need to use technology to implement a Humanitarian Aid.

Venezuela is experiencing the greater health crisis in its history, due to the collapse generated by a government that imposed a series of economic policies without justification or technical foundation, producing a distortion and the subsequent destruction of the public and private health sector, endangering a significant number of people, without neglecting those who died unfortunately because the lack of a on-time medical treatment.

An anachronistic exchange-rate regime, the control over the price of certain medical items, the public and private price speculation, forced incorporation of unskilled medical personnel to the public health system, the proven instability and corruption by public agencies, among others, pushed the closure and cessation of companies activities dedicated to the health sector, including several pharmaceutical and importing companies that maintained for decades the inventory required by the country for medical supplies to the public and private health services.

The closure of insurance companies and even the defaulting of contracts with private clinics and hospitals, have left a population chronically ill in total distress.

Undoubtedly, ill people are living the result of a plan that turned out to be a promoter system of death, and that finally pushed the country to request a Humanitarian Aid to the international community.

Humanitarian aid is a figure whose purpose seeks international cooperation for populations that are victims of a natural phenomenon and other emergencies or humanitarian crises.

This cooperation is based on 4 principles: impartiality, neutrality, humanity and operational independence, being the first three established in the public international law through the Resolution 46/182 of the General Assembly of the United Nations Organization.

In the case of Venezuela, humanitarian aid is formally presented by a request from President Juan Guaidó and later by a legislative act of the National Assembly, creating a Special Commission for Monitoring Humanitarian Aid chaired by (representative) Miguel Pizarro.

The request for an international assistance was heard by the governments of the United States of America, Colombia and Brazil, who through their respective organisms, handle the acquisition and transportation of the goods that will have as final destination Venezuela.

Until now we can confirm:

United States: will send ready-to-eat supplementary food for children in malnutrition situation. (By the Twitter account of Mark Green, administrator of USAID)

Colombia: will send non-perishable food, toilet kit, family kits and some kind of medicines. (Declarations of UNGR Colombia on W Radio)

Swedish Agency for International Development Cooperation (SIDA): It would send about 7.2 million dollars to help Venezuelans who have great needs for food, clean water, health and medical care. (Declaration AIDS)

As we knew by the social media, large quantities of food are accumulating for later distribution in Cúcuta (Colombia), but the most expected items by the population are medical supplies and spare parts for essential devices for the treatment of certain diseases.

Some representatives of the National Assembly and political leaders have stated that studies are being carried out, regarding the current state of the public health situation, and a census is being prepared listing the most needy people.

The above is good news and obviously will help to solve many problems, but we cannot stop thinking that any action at this time has obviously a political purposes, so we doubt that an analysis with the necessary scope and objectivity will be carried out. There is no public confirmation by the health sector associations, which are ultimately the main source for any developing any study of this nature; That is why this question arises: How do countries and NGOs know what goods we actually need?

No one yet has informed if help and advice has been requested to the initiative Sphere, an international NGO, which annually designs and generates a protocol for humanitarian aid, which has become a world benchmark, even for the work of the United Nations Organization.

In our opinion, the only viable way to get a real and effective process, is making a database to keep track of every need reported by medicals centers all around the country, as well as a list provided by specialists, of those cases where the person is in critical condition and at risk of death. Likewise, with the help of the different specialized departments in the public and private sector, such as chemotherapy and dialysis facilities, etc., an inventory of spare parts for equipment that are right now of-out-service.

Obviously making this kind of inventory would be an extremely difficult task, but it does not have to be so if you apply the correct use of current technologies; and we do not refer to Whatsapp or Twitter, which in behalf of the true, have served as tools for people who are making a commendable effort to help the needy, but also it have been used to perpetrate frauds and scams at the international level, using the need of a country as a profile image.

With the implementation of a database with access through a web page, and using as a support group the national medical federation and their respective state chapters, critical cases that require immediate attention could be registered and documented. This will not only serve to obtain the real and actual information, but it can be shared in real time with countries and international organizations that would like to contribute to the humanitarian aid, making them to known our real goods need.

On the other hand, from the technical point of view, the website could have a version in the clearnet and a backup version in the TOR network, in case they were object of blocking actions to it access by the National Telephone Company of Venezuela (CANTV). Also, the database would be encrypted and in that way the data of users and patients would be protected through the use of access credentials.

Likewise, the execution of the project could be carried out through volunteering action by campaigns through social media. The Twitter account of the President Juan Guaidó has approximately one million four hundred thousand followers. We don’t have any doubt in there are trained people who can make this project viable and live in less than 72 hours.

This contribution / criticism for more frivolous that seems, is necessary, because would take humanitarian aid from the political plane to the truly human plane and would respond to the hope of those people who along with their families, are overwhelmed to obtain that medicine on their lives depend, and by the date no one, neither their doctors, have any idea of how it will materialize.

It is unknown the exact amount of medical products that will be received and in what consist it; the entry of these goods into the country has not been possible due to the Inhuman blockade imposed by the de facto government of Nicolás Maduro; and the distribution process is still uncertainty, because we don’t know if it going to reach everybody at time for an effective treatment.

These are elements that should have been considered a priori of any uniform, political discourse and legislative action, since they are determinants for a viable and effective execution of any humanitarian aid that we intend.

The country urgently needs to restore its natural state of democracy, but not at the expense of politicizing a sector that is actually counting the hours to receive the help that so badly needs. Let’s not be more of the same, let’s be better.