Venezuelans in exile must turn to low-cost medical alternatives

<a href=www.sun-sentinel.com>By Sandra Hernandez Staff Writer Posted March 30 2003

Sitting in the small, windowless lobby of Clinic Venamher, Joe Cardozo considers himself a lucky man.

His face is bloated and puffy -- a side effect of the 13 pills he takes daily after a kidney transplant. He earns half of what he did a year ago, forcing him to comb through the family's weekly grocery bill in hopes of finding extras he can eliminate. And he is still paying off the $500 loan he took out in January to cover some of cost of his wife's trip to the emergency room.

Still, Cardozo, 45, feels fortunate to have found this small storefront clinic in Hialeah.

"Thank God. ... Otherwise I couldn't afford to see a doctor," says the father of two.

Cardozo, a graphic designer, moved to Miami two years ago with a comfortable income and the hope of building a life. Then the Venezuelan crisis hit and the struggles began.

Cardozo's story is common among the thousands of Venezuelans in South Florida, many of whom live in such affluent communities as Weston and Key Biscayne. They now face tough health care choices pushing them to small clinics that normally catered to working-poor Hispanics.

"I've never been to this clinic or any type of low-cost clinic because I never had to before," Cardozo says.

His situation stems from the political and economic crisis in Venezuela. The South American nation's economy has been teetering over the past year. The flight of capital, money taken out by investors, was estimated to be near $7 billion last year, and almost $635 million was sent out as remittances to points overseas, according to Robert Bottome, the publisher of several economic business publications in Venezuela.

A crippling two-month strike earlier this year plunged the country into economic chaos. As a result, President Hugo Chávez's government suspended the sale of U.S. dollars, leaving many Venezuelans in South Florida who relied on remittances from their homeland without income. The government recently allowed the limited sale of dollars for students living abroad.

Those who had businesses in South Florida also were affected after trade between Venezuela and the United States began faltering. Trade between the Port of Miami and Venezuela dropped by 30 percent last year, according to Trenae Floyd, a port spokeswoman. As a result, dozens of local businesses shut down and scores of workers were laid off.

Xiomara Castillo was among those affected. In December she closed the export company she founded 10 years earlier. She had five Venezuelan employees.

"I'm one of the lucky ones that kept their medical insurance," says Castillo, who now works at the Venezuelan American Chamber of Commerce. "But I get calls here all the time now because they need a doctor. ... This is a situation that is completely new for many people, and not just middle-class but people who had money are now facing this problem."

One answer is Clinic Venamher. The modest four-room clinic bills itself as a low-income center that caters to Venezuelans. It is run by the Venezuelan-American Brotherhood, a nonprofit group formed in 1999 to help survivors of the floods that left thousands dead in Venezuela and expanded to offer health care here. Until recently, most of the clinic's patients were poorer Latinos, but that began to change last year.

"In the last three months the number of Venezuelans coming to the clinic has grown by 80 percent," says Ernesto Ackerman, the clinic's director and a member of the brotherhood. "We have always taken care of anyone who walks in and we see a lot of working-class patients, but these days we also attend to many upper middle-class patients who just don't have medical insurance but still need to see a doctor."

Among those who saw their fortunes change are Heli Saul Colina and his wife, Maritza, who moved from Venezuela two years ago with a comfortable income and health insurance from that country. These days, however, they find themselves in a pinch.

"We only have health insurance for emergencies; otherwise, we don't have anything," says Maritza Colina, adding that it covers only hospital emergency room visits.

The Colinas' resources are dwindling. The family relied on Heli Saul Colina's monthly pension. A former university professor, he received nearly $3,500 a month from Venezuela when they first arrived in Kendall. But as the crisis worsened and the Venezuelan bolivar's value dropped, their income shrunk to about half that. It has been more than a month since the Colinas received their last payment from the pension, leaving them strapped for cash.

"My husband is working on the weekends as a pizza delivery driver," she says.

Maritza Colina says her story is common among friends and family: Many of them don't know where to turn or are afraid if they are here on tourist visas that will soon expire.

"I know about the clinic because I recently heard some information at an event, but I think most people don't know it exists," she said.

Officials from the clinic acknowledge as much, saying they have tried to use such events as the January march on Calle Ocho to get out fliers to local Venezuelans.

Tough economic times also have hit the clinic, according to Pedro Gonzalez, president of the brotherhood. The group is short about $2,000 of the estimated $6,000 it needs monthly just to operate the clinic. The group funds the center using donations from patients and the money it raises from members.

The group was hoping a fund-raiser sponsored by the Spanish Broadcasting System, which owns three local Spanish-language radio stations, would rescue it. The concert, however, was canceled in mid-March because of the war with Iraq and other problems.

"I guess we'll just keep trying, but it is hard, especially because we can only operate until the money runs out," Gonzalez says.

Sandra Hernandez can be reached at shernandez@sun-sentinel.com or 954-395-7923.