Venezuela earthquake death toll rises to 2,295 one week after twin quakes

One week after back-to-back magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 earthquakes devastated northern Venezuela, the official death toll has risen to 2,295, with hopes of finding more survivors fading and the threat of hunger and disease growing among millions of displaced people.

National Assembly President Jorge Rodríguez announced the updated toll on Wednesday, with more than 11,000 people injured. The United Nations estimates some 50,000 people remain missing, and the International Organization for Migration has warned that up to 6.76 million people could be affected by the disaster.yahoo+4

Fading Hope, Rare Miracles

As the one-week mark passed, rescue operations continued but with diminishing chances of finding people alive. In a rare moment of hope, a three-year-old boy named Klieber Morán was pulled alive from the rubble on Tuesday — six days after the quakes — by a Jordanian rescue team operating in La Guaira state. Interim President Delcy Rodríguez called the child's rescue a "beacon of hope for our people". In total, more than 6,460 people have been rescued from collapsed buildings.orinocotribune+3

Yet the scale of devastation dwarfs the rescue successes. Many survivors have described digging through rubble with their bare hands amid what the International Rescue Committee called a response that "does not match the scale of humanitarian need".nbcnews

Hunger and Disease Loom

The UN's Resident Coordinator in Venezuela, Gianluca Rampolla del Tindaro, disclosed Monday that the organization was procuring 10,000 body bags in coordination with Venezuelan authorities — a grim proxy for expected casualties still buried beneath collapsed structures. The U.S. Geological Survey has warned the final toll could exceed 10,000.reuters+2

The World Food Programme is seeking $50 million to provide emergency food to 500,000 people over three months, while the World Health Organization has warned that at least three health facilities were critically damaged. NASA estimates approximately 59,000 structures were damaged or destroyed.nbcnews

A Nation in Crisis

The earthquakes struck on June 24 at 6:04 p.m. local time near San Felipe, about 200 miles west of Caracas, with the two quakes hitting just 39 seconds apart. The UNDP estimates direct physical damage of $6.7 billion, equivalent to roughly six percent of Venezuela's GDP.news.un+3

The Trump administration has pledged more than $300 million in humanitarian aid, while 24 countries have sent rescue personnel, supplies, and search dogs. But for the tens of thousands still unaccounted for, the passage of time has turned the search from rescue to recovery.aljazeera+1