Venezuelan Child Who Protested Medicine Shortages Passes Away

Eight-Year-Old Failed to Receive Drugs, Care to Beat Lymphoma

Orlando Avendaño 

Shortage of drugs led Oliver Sanchez and his family to protest. (El Estímulo)

The eight year old whose image went viral several months ago after participating in a protest against Venezuela’s drug shortages died recently after he was unable to receive the medicine he needed.
“I want to get better, peace and health,” Sanchez’s sign read during a demonstration, which made him the face of an unprecedented humanitarian crisis turned Venezuela.
Oliver Sanchez was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma just over a year ago, but shortages of medicines needed for treatment led him and his family to participate in the demonstration.
“We are in a desperate situation,” his mother Mitzaida Berroterán said at the time.



Sanchez’s cousin Ricardo Lobo told the newspaper Efecto Cocuyo that at the time, the child “asked for paper and a pencil and wrote the sign.”
Lobo said that what little medical care they could get ended up being by donation.
Last week, Sanchez’s condition, affected by a respiratory infection, landed him in the Hospital Dr. Elias Toro in Caracas; however, there wasn’t an available bed for him.
The neighbor of the Sanchez family Esperanza Hermida said he had to get the money to move Oliver to a clinic, where he later died.
“His mother took him to the clinic, Hermida said. “It’s very hard. I was crying while talking about his case.”
Source: Efecto Cocuyo