Venezuelan Women Are Getting Sterilized To Avoid Pregnancy In A Socialist Dystopia

Matt Vespa | September 03, 2016 6:00 PM

We already know the Venezuela is a disaster. People are breaking into zoos to eat animals because of food shortages. There’s also the harrowing footage of Venezuelans eating out of garbage cans. Medicine is in short supply, a serious problem for the 200,000 Venezuelans living with chronic illnesses (yes, people have died as a result). Energy shortages have led to rolling blackouts, which have impacted the maternity wards at hospitals. As a result, the number of babies dying has spiked. The conditions within that system are akin to the 19^th century, with some places lacking basic items like gloves and soap.

Looting has been rampant as people struggle to survive. To avoid the appearance of a crisis, the government has banned lines outside of bakeries. In all, virtually every aspect of Venezuelan socioeconomic life has collapsed. So, would you raise a family in this socialist nightmare? The answer is no—and women are opting to sterilize themselves to avoid pregnancies and the cost of raising children in a country that simply can’t provide basic services for its people. Oh, I forgot to mention, even basic birth control could be viewed as a luxury item, like toilet paper, since no one can find that either (via Fox News Latino):

With traditional contraceptives like condoms and birth control pills virtually impossible to get in Venezuela, scores of women in the economically-crumbling, socialist nation are opting to get sterilized to avoid the costs of pregnancy and raising a child.

While there are no national statistics available on the number of women getting sterilization, a look at the operations of one health clinic in the state of Miranda, just southeast of Caracas, shows how popular the hard-to-reverse procedure has become as Venezuelans struggle amid soaring inflation, high crime and political unrest.

The clinic offers 40 slots during its so-called “sterilization day” offered regularly at a number of clinics in wealthier sections of the city, but as recently as last year, it did not come close to filling them. Now, however, all the slots are filled, and there is a waiting list of around 500 women hoping to get the procedure.