Mission Barrio Adentro

rdf:langString Mission Barrio Adentro

rdf:langString Mission Barrio Adentro (English: Mission Into the Neighborhood) is a Venezuelan social welfare program established by the President Hugo Chávez. Initially billed as an attempt to deliver a de facto form of universal healthcare, Barrio Adentro later became a way to grant access to medical care to Venezuelan citizens whose political stance the Bolivarian government deemed acceptable. Of a planned 8,500 Barrio Adentro I centers, 2,708 had been built by May 2007, using an investment of around US$126 million, with a further 3,284 under construction. In Caracas, Mission Barrio Adentro I and II centers in 32 parishes were the subject of constant complaints regarding performance even after receiving 1.492 million bolívares from the government. As of December 2014, it was estimated that 80% of Barrio Adentro establishments were abandoned in Venezuela, with the majority of Cuban medical personnel leaving the country. By the end of 2015, the Bolivarian government reported that one in three of Venezuelan patients admitted to public health facilities that year died. In October 2016, the Miami Herald reported that hundreds of doctors were being recalled by the Cuban government, allegedly due to a lack of payments by Venezuela.