Facing life or death, pregnant Venezuelans flee to Colombia

Cucuta : Dayana Zambrano's belly is remarkably small for a woman nearly nine months pregnant.

Malnutrition suffered due to Venezuela's downward economic spiral forced her to move to Colombia for medical attention -- so she could give birth without it becoming a matter of life and death.

She journeyed more than 1,200 kilometers (750 miles) by bus from eastern Venezuela's Ciudad Bolivar to reach Cucuta, Colombia for medical care, one of many pregnant Venezuelans looking outside their crisis-stricken country's borders for vital care.

She recently arrived at the university hospital Erasmo Meoz with an excessively low weight for her advanced stage of pregnancy.

"Thank God, my weight increased and the doctor told me the baby is doing well," the 21-year-old woman told AFP. "He just needed to grow his lungs a little bit, because they were tiny."

Zambrano's decision to flee her country reflects the increasingly dire situation in Venezuela.

Amid the South American country's turbulent political and economic crisis, infant mortality reached 30.12 percent in 2016, with nearly 11,500 deaths of children between zero and one year old.

The maternal mortality rate has exploded to 65 percent, according to the Venezuelan Ministry of Health.