Menu

03/05/13 - NBC 6 South Florida - Venezuela: Hugo Chavez Hit By New, Severe Infection, Condition "Very Delicate" 

A severe new respiratory infection has hit cancer-stricken President Hugo
Chavez and his condition is "very delicate," Venezuela's government says.
 
A brief statement read on national television by Communications Minister
Ernesto Villegas late Monday carried the sobering news about the
charismatic 58-year-old socialist leader's deteriorating health.

  Villegas said Chavez is suffering from "a new, severe infection." The
state news agency identified it as respiratory.
 
Chavez has been undergoing "chemotherapy of strong impact," Villegas added
without providing further details.
 
Chavez has neither been seen nor heard from, except for photos released in
mid-February, since submitting to a fourth round of surgery in Cuba on Dec.
11 for an unspecified cancer in the pelvic area. It was first diagnosed in
June 2011.
 
The government says he returned home on Feb. 18 and has been confined to
Caracas' military hospital since.
 
Villegas said Chavez was "standing by Christ and life, conscious of the
difficulties he faces."
 
He also took the opportunity to lash out at "the corrupt Venezuelan right"
for what he called a psychological war seeking "scenarios of violence as a
pretext for foreign intervention."
 
The communications minister called on Chavez's supporters, who include
thousands of well-armed militiamen, to be "on a war footing."
 
Upon Chavez's death, the opposition would contest the government's
candidate in a snap election that it argues should have been called after
Chavez was unable to be sworn in on Jan. 10 as the constitution stipulates.
 
Indeed, the campaigning has already begun, although undeclared. Vice
President Nicolas Maduro, who Chavez has said should succeed him, has
frequently commandeered all broadcast channels, Chavez-style, to tout the
"revolution" and vilify the opposition.
 
Chavez has run Venezuela for more than 14 years as a virtual one-man show,
gradually placing all state institutions under his personal control. But
the former army paratroop commander who rose to fame by launching a failed
1992 coup, never groomed a successor with his force of personality.
 
Chavez was last re-elected on Oct. 7, and his challenger, youthful Miranda
state Gov. Henrique Capriles, is expected to again be the opposition's
candidate.
 
One of Chavez's three daughters, Maria Gabriela, expressed thanks to
well-wishers via her Twitter account. "We will prevail!" she wrote, echoing
a favorite phrase of her father. "With God always."
 
Maduro said last week that the president had begun receiving chemotherapy
around the end of January.
 
Doctors have said that such therapy was not necessarily to try to beat
Chavez's cancer into remission, but could have been palliative, to extend
Chavez's life and ease his suffering.
 
Dr. Carlos Castro, scientific director of the Colombian League Against
Cancer in Bogota, Colombia, said "it's difficult to predict" when Chavez
might die, but he believes "it's a matter of days."
 
Castro said that Chavez could face further respiratory complications if he
receives more intense chemotherapy treatment.
 
If the president's medical team "gives him strong chemotherapy again, then
it would not be surprising if some infections reappear," Castro said in a
telephone interview.
 
While in Cuba, Chavez suffered a severe respiratory infection in late
December that nearly killed him, Maduro said last week. A tracheal tube was
inserted then and government officials have said his breathing remained
labored.
 
Libardo Rodriguez, a 60-year-old man who sells orange juice on the street
in Caracas, said he was very worried after Monday evening's announcement
regarding Chavez's condition. The government, he added, should provide more
information.
 
"We are worried because he does not appear. The truth is that I don't know
what's happening," said Rodriguez, a Chavez supporter.
 
Rodriguez complained about what he described as the government's vague
updates regarding Chavez's health.
 
"There are many rumors and nobody knows who to believe," he said. "We hope
he's alive."
 
In Cuba, Chavez has undergone a series of radiation treatments and
chemotherapy after his operations. But the entire treatment regimen was
kept far from public scrutiny.

Copyright Associated Press


Original Source / Fuente Original:
http://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/Venezuela-Hugo-Chavez-Hit-By-New-Severe-Infection-Condition-Very-Delicate-195257781.html