Colombia’s president has ordered his nation’s border with Venezuela closed as a coronavirus containment measure. Iván Duque announced late Friday that all official border crossing with the neighboring Andean nation will be shuttered beginning at 5 a.M. Saturday.
The two nations share a porous 1,370-mile (2,200-kilometer) border that is crossed by thousands of Venezuelans each day searching for food and medicine.
Many also cross to permanently leave their nation’s economic crisis. Venezuelan officials announced earlier Friday that they have confirmed their first two coronavirus cases.
Over 4.5 million Venezuelans have fled in recent years, many arriving in Colombia. Experts in Colombia are concerned that the migration crisis could exacerbate the spread of coronavirus throughout the region. Colombia has 16 confirmed cases.
Venezuela’s announcement of its first coronavirus cases deepened anxiety in a struggling nation where many hospitals lack basics such as water and soap and struggle to treat even basic ailments.
“God help us,” hospital patient Carlos Chacón said after hearing the news that the pandemic had arrived in Venezuela.
“My mom is old and sick. So is my father,” said Chacón, a 48-year-old electrician who was first hospitalized four months ago with two broken legs from a motorcycle accident. “Here I am in this condition, stuck in this hospital bed.”
Earlier Friday, Vice President Delcy RodrÃguez delivered the news that Venezuelans feared was coming: A 52-year-old man who had recently traveled from Spain, and a 41-year-old woman who had returned from a trip through the U.S., Italy and Spain, have been diagnosed with the virus.
Schools across Venezuela immediately closed, a day after President Nicolás Maduro suspended flights with Europe and Colombia in an attempt to ward off the illness.
Juan Guaidó also called off upcoming street demonstrations, taking away one of the U.S-backed opposition leader’s tools in his year-long battle to oust Maduro.