The market for disaster relief has found a new, albeit unconventional, venue: a country club in Caracas. As the ground trembled and the earth swallowed homes, Venezuela’s crumbling infrastructure buckled under the weight of a 7.3-magnitude earthquake. The state’s hospitals, already running on empty, were overwhelmed. So the wealthy did what they always do in a crisis: they retreated to their gated enclaves. But this time, they opened the gates.
The Caracas Country Club, a bastion of exclusivity for the city’s elite, has become a makeshift hospital. Golf carts ferry the injured across manicured fairways. The clubhouse, once the site of champagne-soaked celebrations, now echoes with the cries of the wounded. It is a stark illustration of Venezuela’s collapse, where even the rich cannot fully insulate themselves from the chaos of a failed state.
But let’s not mistake charity for capital flight. The country club’s transformation is not an act of altruism; it is a survival instinct. When the state fails, private networks step in. The same wealthy few who siphoned billions out of the country through currency controls are now funding this medical outpost. They are hedging their bets, ensuring that if they cannot escape the rubble, they can at least be treated in familiar surroundings.
The numbers are grim. Over 300 injured, many with fractures, crush injuries, and the psychological scars of panic attacks. The country club’s staff, trained to serve canapés, now administer basic first aid. The Red Cross has set up a triage centre in the pro shop, where members once debated their handicap. The irony is not lost on anyone: the same economic mismanagement that drove the country into penury is now forcing the elite to improvise medical care on the 18th hole.
From a fiscal perspective, this is a disaster within a disaster. Venezuela’s GDP has contracted by over 50% in the past decade. Hyperinflation has rendered the bolívar worthless. The government, preoccupied with political survival, has neither the resources nor the will to respond effectively. The country club hospital is a microcosm of a broader trend: the privatisation of disaster response. When the state cannot provide, the private sector must. But this is not market efficiency; it is market failure by default.
The capital flight that drained Venezuela of its wealth is now manifesting as a flight to physical security. Those with means are fortifying their homes and building private clinics. They are preparing for the next collapse, not the next boom. The bond market has long priced in this risk. Venezuelan sovereign bonds trade at pennies on the dollar, a discount that reflects not just default risk but the complete erosion of state capacity.
Meanwhile, the central bank prints more money, fuelling inflation that destroys whatever purchasing power remains. The country club’s makeshift hospital runs on donated supplies. Morphine is scarce. X-ray machines are powered by generators running on black-market fuel. It is a snapshot of a nation caught in a vicious cycle: the state’s failure breeds private desperation, which in turn undermines any chance of recovery.
Investors should take note. This is not a one-off tragedy. It is a systemic blow to the idea of state resilience. If Venezuela’s elite cannot rely on the state for basic healthcare, why should foreign investors trust the government with their capital? The country club hospital is a monument to mismanagement, a testament to the cost of ignoring fiscal discipline.
As night falls over the country club, the floodlights of the tennis courts illuminate the stretchers lined up on the grass. The golf course, once a symbol of leisure, is now a field of triage. The market has spoken. Venezuela’s risk premium has soared. The question is no longer whether the state can serve its people, but whether the private sector can fill the void before the next tremor hits.
