CARACAS: Venezuelan opposition lawmakers on Tuesday charged President Nicolas Maduro's government with allowing the country's health care system to sink into decay so severe it has left many to die.
The opposition-controlled National Assembly said that blanket shortages of medications and medical supplies affected 90 percent of the population in "the worst crisis in (the system's) history."
Lawmakers also said the lack of drugs and supplies was linked to "the deaths of Venezuelans," urging Maduro to declare a health care emergency and to guarantee citizens access to basic medicines.
The accusations come days after opposition lawmakers rejected Maduro's bid to decree a state of economic emergency over what the president called the "catastrophic" state of Venezuela's economy.
The Latin American country has the world's biggest known crude oil reserves, but a 70 percent plunge in crude prices over the past year and a half has slashed public revenues.
In a legislative hearing on Tuesday, citizens Richard Medina and John Perez told how they recently lost their son to cancer and mother to heart disease because there were no drugs unavailable to treat them.
Opposition lawmaker Dinorah Figuera slammed Maduro for not addressing issues with the health system in his recent state of the union address.
The lawmakers also criticized what they said were lack of sufficient hospital beds and high turnover among health ministers -- three in the past five years.
And they suggested Maduro's government hid important information about recent malaria, dengue, chikungunya and zika epidemics from the public, leaving Venezuelans "without adequate preparation".
Maduro's allies in the assembly put forward their own proposal that doctors spend 20 percent of their time working pro bono to solve the crisis, although the measure did not get approved.
Opposition lawmakers last week rejected Maduro's bid to decree a state of economic emergency, deepening the tense political standoff that has seen Venezuela hit with shortages of food and goods.
The decree would have given the president special powers to commandeer private companies' resources, impose currency controls and other unspecified measures.
But the opposition speaker of the congress, Henry Ramos Allup, said it would be "irresponsible for the National Assembly to blindly approve a decree of such magnitude, scope and implications".
The same day, Venezuela's central bank released its first economic growth and inflation statistics in more than a year showing the economy shrank 4.5 percent in the first nine months of 2015.
Annualized inflation in September hit a painful 141.5 percent, fueled by crippling shortages.
Analysts say the political deadlock threatens to worsen the hardship that drove voters to hand the opposition a landslide election victory last month.
They have warned of the risk of a repeat of violent street clashes that left 43 people dead in 2014.
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