VILLA EL SALVADOR, Peru (AP) – In the midst of what was once a desert outside of Peru’s capital, many residents have a new routine.
While the lives of their friends or family are in danger due to the new coronavirus, the residents of Villa El Salvador spend their days looking for where to buy oxygen, preferably without having to spend their life savings.
Oxygen is crucial to saving the lives of those who became seriously ill from COVID-19. And in this district of more than 508,000 inhabitants, it has become a rare commodity as a second wave of infections hits the country.
“It’s very sad to see that too and that all people also go through this,” said Noa Torres, 34, outside a facility that sells oxygen on Thursday. “It is sad to see that everyone, not just me, that everyone is waiting for oxygen for their family.”
People transport empty oxygen tanks – bought on the black market – around the city in hopes of finding a place to fill them. The search for oxygen is due in part to the government’s lack of preparedness to face the pandemic. Most hospitals in Peru lack the necessary equipment to produce oxygen.
The desperation of people to find oxygen has led some businesses to triple their price, forcing many to dip into their savings or sell belongings to buy it.
But while some are raising prices, others are coming to the aid. In Villa El Salvador, a group of 13 friends, including engineers, economists and lawyers, pooled their savings to recently open an oxygen plant. At their facility, they sell a cubic meter of oxygen for an equivalent of $ 4.10, compared to $ 13.69 elsewhere.
Young entrepreneurs assure that they are not trying to profit from COVID-19, they only want to help the most vulnerable population in Lima. Since it opened, the plant has attracted people from all over the city. Rows of lemon-green cylinders are visible on the sidewalk.
“In my house, for example, everyone” has had COVID, said Juan Carlos Urbano, 45, as he waited for the tank to be filled outside the place. “Right now there are four who are in full swing (COVID), and one is seriously in need of oxygen; I think most of the families are in that situation ”.
Peru accumulates more than a million cases and more than 39,000 deaths from COVID-19, according to statistics from Johns Hopkins University.
Developing nations often lack a reliable supply of medical oxygen, unlike rich areas in Europe and North America, where special trucks deliver it liquefied and it is piped directly to the beds of coronavirus patients.
But even in Los Angeles, the recent surge in coronavirus cases has overwhelmed clinics capacity and created such an oxygen shortage that ambulances have been ordered not to transport patients who cannot be resuscitated in the field.
Other parts of Peru, as well as some of Bolivia, Mexico and Brazil, have also suffered periodic oxygen shortages after COVID-19 cases soared in recent months.
The Peruvian government on Thursday unveiled new equipment to produce oxygen to assist hospitals across the country.
“Oxygen is life, and these plants will bring life to various regions throughout the country, and will continue working to ensure that health and the right to life is something concrete and real for all Peruvians”, declared the president Francisco Sagasti at the unveiling ceremony.
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