Escarli is afraid of the dark. German appears absent. Yuri tips into rage at the smallest upset. Mental malaise in Venezuela is growing, a hidden anguish adding to the litany of ills ravaging the country. A nationwide blackout, unprecedented in scale and length, only worsened the psychological descent for Venezuelans as they watched cash machines and water pipes shut down for lack of electricity, and their homes plunged into darkness. The outage lasted five days, to Tuesday this week. But the trauma goes on, giving some residents a haunted look — people tottering on the edge after four years of political and socioeconomic crisis. “There is desperation,” summed up Jorge de Avila, a 38-year-old store employee who lined up at dawn to buy canisters of cooking gas in a dangerous poor district in the southeast of Caracas. The neighborhood of makeshift houses spent seven days with no power, and two weeks without water. The little food stored in fridges spoiled, and the local clinic ceased operations. “These have been hard days. We have no access to services, to food. Many families with children are sinking into despair. Many shops are shut. A lot of food has spoiled,” De Avila told AFP. ‘Chronic’ anxiety Stefania Aguzzi, a psychologist heading a free mental health association that consults by telephone, said many Venezuelans are “suffering with enormous sadness” that could “become depression very quickly, with anxiety levels that would turn chronic.” The blackout was a dramatic blow on top of a deteriorating situation for the country of 30 million inhabitants who are reduced to daily protests and struggling to survive against a tsunami of hyperinflation and lack of cash, food and medicine. For days it paralyzed the country, knocking out bank card terminals in shops used to electronically pay for what goods were available, forcing citizens to increasingly turn to the ony currency available: dollars. Water pumps stopped working. Some hospitals without standalone generators collapsed. “We’re in a bad way, and on guard because there’s looting going on, some establishments are being robbed. There is tension. Police are firing shots, running after those people. You lock your doors but don’t know if they’re going to turn on you,” said Gabriela Martinez, a 37-year-old administrator. For Mayaro Ortega, a psychologist and researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, “this state of chronic emergency is a risk factor for developing post-traumatic stress.” When someone is incapable of securing basic necessities and personal safety, they can fall victim to panic attacks even while outwardly appearing calm, she explained. “Children are the most vulnerable.” ‘I feel afraid’ Escarli, a nine-year-old girl with shining dark eyes, fears the darkness the blackout brought. “When I go to pee I feel afraid because I feel that somebody is going to come and scare me,” said the girl, who has spent a week without going to school because of the power outage. Ortega said Venezuela was impacted by “collective stress.” “It’s contagious, and is spread initially because we’re social beings. Evolutionarily speaking, we are built to feel empathy for others and what happened in the past still affects us,” she said. Rage is another symptom. Yuri Martera says she is gripped with fury and “can’t tolerate anyone.” She lost control of herself when one of her neighbors expressed unconditional support for the government of President Nicolas Maduro. Published in Daily Times, March 18th 2019.