​On Saturday, April 11​ ​a major fire ​was ignited ​around the Algodonal Hospital, also known as The Dr. José Ignacio Baldó General Hospital.  It's located in the Antímano Parish of the Libertador Municipality of the Capital District on the west side of Caracas. It is one of the most important public health centers in the city, a full service hospital and a department dedicated to the treatment of respiratory diseases. Like many health centers in Venezuela, the Algodonal Hospital operates with inadequate medical supplies and maintenance due to the brutal sanctions imposed by the US government. Nonetheless, it is one of 46 treatment centers prepared for treating the victims of Covid-19. ​In his March 12 address to the nation President Maduro, introduced the government's coordinated national strategy for combating Covid-19.

In one part of his address President Maduro stated,

"The Venezuelan health system has decided to declare it a permanent emergency for prevention, protection anywhere in the country. We have made the forecasts as far as the criminal sanctions allow us, I have to always say, this would be a time to demand that President Donald Trump lift the criminal sanctions against Venezuela so that Venezuela can go to the market to buy everything that it needs at the medical level to curb this situation. It costs us three times to go out and look for the tests, the diagnostic tests, but we have managed to have enough for this stage, and we continue to search to have enough diagnostic tests for the subsequent stages that may come; the treatment kits for the derivatives of pneumonia and respiratory diseases caused by the coronavirus. Right now we have decided to make available 46 public hospitals all over the nation as the center of the coronavirus care process throughout the national territory, and we have made the respective coordination so that the private system do the same.​"​

[Please find the President's full statement here.]

The Algodonal Hospital is one of the 46 treatment centers mentioned by President Maduro, preparing for the possibility of an exponential increase of infections seen in other countries but not having begun yet in Venezuela due to the preventative actions taken by the government - but more on that later.



Exploding electrical transformers and fire
​Two weeks ago, in the early morning hours of March 25 ​the ​six transformers ​that provide electrical service to the​ Aldodonal Hospital blew up simultaneously. Of course it's not not uncommon for a transformer to fail but six exploding simultaneously is most unusual. ​Many Venezuelans suspected sabotage. ​

Th​e Algodonal Hospital also happens to be the same ​parish as the​ pilot project ​for the national plan for development of urban and rural agriculture by the National Congress of Campesinos​​ and Pescadores (NCCP). Orailene Maccarri Diaz, JD, voice of the NCCP lives within sight of the hospital and familiar with its services. On March 31, Axis of Logic published her exclusive report,

Venezuela vs. Covid-19​ regarding the pilot project. Members of the community were the first to sound the alarm and combat the fire as it threatened the hospital and also their food supply as they had just completed planting of their first parcels with herbs and vegetables this month. But as you will see in the official reports of Saturday’s fire, it was not limited only to the Antimano Parish in Caracas.


Maccarri called me on Saturday at noon reporting that the fire was already fully-involved in its fifth stage. She said it surround​ed the ​ Algodonal Hospital within sight of her home and was encroaching on the agricultural project and the neighbors' houses, the whole area engulfed in smoke. The community was creating firebreaks and fighting the blaze when 60 firefighters arrived shortly after she called them and they all joined in the battle together working into the evening. Over 20 families had to evacuate their houses until the​ fire was brought under control​ at 9 pm when they thought they had it liquidated.

Community members went to their homes sick with smoke inhalation and the firefighters remained ​to guard against re-ignition. But at 11 p.m. Maccarri sent me another message​, "I must go out and fight, again the fire goes on. This official report [below] covers the fire today as it happened simultaneously in various sectors of the city."

​Updated part of forest and urban fires presented on 04/11/2020 in the city of Caracas and its surrounding cities at 8:22 PM

• Algodonal Fire
  

Status: controlled liquidation is working..
Affected area: approximately 5 hectares.

• ​Fire in Waraira Repano National Park, La Matica sector.

Status: controlled and liquidated
Affected area: 3 hectares

• ​Fire​!​ Old Road Caracas la Guaira, Plan de Manzano sector. 

Status: In combat.

• Baruta Municipality, La Limonera sector

Status: Partially Controlled.

• Fir​e​​! Km 13 Regional del centro,Sector la Loma

Status: Controlled, completed.
Approximate area: 1.5 hectares

​Fire​. Baruta municipality, I can see the water sector adjacent to the gas filling plant.

Status: partially controlled.  (Gas plant out of risk)

• ​Fire​. E​levation 905, police: 

Status: completed.
Area affected: 600 mts

• ​Fire​.​ Km 26 of the Junquito, sector 

Status: in combat.

• 02 fires in combat 
• 02 partially controlled 
• 01 in liquidation
• 03 completed

"In the Algodonal it was not by chance, the forest fires do not originate in 5 different distant points simultaneously. The opposition has orders to generate forest fires to first have the firemen occupied ​and they have difficulties with the machines​ which malfunction.​ The​ arsonists also ignite in places where there is no access to hydrants​ that have positive water pressure. Third​,​ they do it to be able to contaminate the environment and to generate heat to prevent the entrance of solar rays and in addition it affects the throats of the people which makes them more ​vulnerable to ​Covid-19.”

"It is important to know that in the face of the imminent danger of this inclement fire, a synchrony developed in the actions deployed between the Hugo Chávez Battle Units, Clap [subsidized food program for the poor] and the Communal Council, which together in the territory we call the Network of Socio-Political Articulation. We are aware that all the people must protect themselves from unconventional attacks on our country. We are always on a permanent state of alert to give an immediate response and this is how we are able to provide safe places for our elderly people and those with disabilities. We include activities with the educators and psychologists of the sector to distract our children from worry and fear and in the case of fires like these we use logic and hydration with everyone, including the heroic firefighters. During these days with coronavirus threatening we always apply the measures established by the government: to avoid the propagation of the Covid-19, permanent communication by all digital and mechanical means to transmit social calm, always with technical information provided by the professionals along with the related content for reflection regarding the preservation of life on the planet (including plants and trees). In the face of this desolate scenario, we love each other more and already the commitment to take on reforestation together as a community with government oversight has germinated, because we are the Caribbean Force, the rebel force that has taken the decision to live on our feet with dignity."

Fires in Venezuela during 24-hour period April 11

Concluding thoughts:
​T​he​ two incidents at the Antimano Parish taken alone, the March 25 simultaneous explosions of 6 transformers ​serving the Algodonal Hospital and the ​April 11 ​fire​ ignited at 5 distant points surrounding the hospital in the same hour may seem to be suspicious but can as easily be explained as coincidental, even if criminal acts took place. But a more comprehensive analysis of these two events in the context of the 20-year long US assault on Venezuela combined with the well-documented exploitation of the coronavirus by the United States is needed to understand why mere suspicion becomes reason for alarm and a defensive response by the Venezuelan people and their elected government.

There's no need to recount in detail the many attempts by the US to first overthrow the government of late-president, Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías and, since his death, the current Venezuelan government under President Nicolás Maduro. The US spawned violent coup attempts, assassinations, funding of the opposition, destruction of infrastructure and public schools, health centers and government buildings, the wounding and killing of thousands of civilians, the demonization of the Venezuelan leadership by the western media, threats of invasion, the manifold sanctions and the intensive 6 year war on the Venezuelan economy are all well-known and documented. Only Washington's bizarre appointment of little-known and unelected Juan Guaido as "Interim President" with the invention of a "parallel government" in 2019 is noteworthy because the highly visible and embarrassing failure of that outrageous folly sheds light on Washington's remake of the same tactics in 2020.

The reinvention for "regime change" this year even eclipses the display of blunt stupidity that rose over the Potomac in 2019. The new plan trumpeted by the Trump regime designates Venezuela as a "Narco-Terrorist State," suddenly making it the main source of cocaine flooding the US and, therefore, guilty of State-Sponsored Terrorism! Then they framed that work of student art with a handy conviction of President Maduro and members of his administration conviction in an imperial US court. With that under their belt, Trump then announced that the US has placed a multi-million dollar hang-em-high bounty on the heads of these elected officials, in effect offering mercenaries cash to take them all out!

This is now followed by Trump's "Maximum Pressure" campaign, another layer of sanctions and deployment of US Navy warships to the Caribbean ostensibly for interdicting Venezuela's alleged cocaine shipments. But this is obviously meant to menace the Venezuelan people and government for their disobedience with Washington’s fantasy that, if sufficiently threatened, the people and military will do the regime-change for them. US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo uttered those very words in a press conference this week. If I may borrow from the vernacular, "you can't make this shit up" - but-they-did and their brainless cheer-leading squad in the corporate media puts lipstick on the pig.  



Enter Covid-19
As of this writing today, the US can finally claim in truth, "We're Number 1" - leading the world by far with 558,199 confirmed infections and 22,154 deaths, 3 times higher than infections in Spain which has the second highest numbers, 169,496 infections and 17,489 fatalities. The US is the only country without a national integrated strategy to contain the spread of the virus and protect its own citizens. But instead of admitting its failure, Washington, true to the nature of the beast, goes on the attack blaming the World Pandemic on China, robbing its own allies of their desperately needed medical equipment, medicines and protective gear and accusing countries with successful results of fudging their numbers.

Covid-19 in Venezuela: To this hour, Venezuela has ​181 confirmed infections, 9 fatalities and 93 full recoveries as reported by Johns-Hopkins University the go-to authority for tracking the spread of the virus country by country (see here).

Venezuela’s numbers are among the lowest in the world.

The US is now faced with its history of failure in Venezuela as its media shills smile while predicting that the country will be crushed by Covid-19. The Bolivarian Republic's success against all odds notwithstanding, it survives after taking the most powerful blows the empire has to throw. Read into that what you will. From my vantage point living among the poor in Venezuela, the United States government is not happy with the success of the Maduro government's containment of the spread of the coronavirus.

In Venezuela, the numbers of infections, deaths and recoveries are among the lowest in the world. For the US, things simply are not going according to plan. In addition to blocking medical equipment and medicines for Covid-19 victims, the US government will do everything possible to ensure that the virus spreads, that victims are denied treatment, and that more Venezuelans die, blaming the suffering and deaths on Maduro's "corruption, human rights violations, drug trafficking and mismanagement" - and of course socialism. So when we see 6 transformers that supply a coronavirus hospital exploding simultaneously and adjacent multiple fires ignited in 5 different locations within less than an hour's time, damned right the Venezuelan people point their collective finger and fist North.

UPDATE April 13:
The fire at Antimano re-ignited about an hour ago (afternoon) either by arson or from the ashes on Saturday night. Firefighters are back on the scene tonight fighting the blaze. - lmb

US President Donald J Trump