Nicolas Maduro, a former autobus driver and Venezuela's sitting president, has announced a campaign to back up his country'southward medical staff amid the coronavirus pandemic by airdropping one Petro to each doctor.

The 'Doctors of the Homeland' initiative will encounter each Venezuelan doctor air-dropped one of the administration'southward oil-backed Petro cryptocurrency tokens, as per an April ii tweet published past a government official.

Venezuela to issue Petro bonus to doctors

The tokens volition exist distributed using Venezuela'due south 'Patria System' — a platform launched by the government to bypass the nation's failing banking system and issue bonuses and subsidies using the cryptographic token.

Petro tokens are purportedly pegged to the price of one barrel of Venezuelan oil. Following a crash down to eighteen-year lows during March, the price of oil has bounced 20% in the past mean solar day to currently merchandise for roughly $27 per barrel.

Petro sees minimal adoption

While the Maduro assistants claims that the Petro is worth roughly $60, popular trading platforms used by Venezuelans currently list the token for roughly between $20 and $26.

Nevertheless, with Venezuelan monthly minimum wages equating to $3.61 plus $ii.89 in food stamps, and doctors estimated to earn niggling more, one Petro could equate to several months of work.

Venezuelan hospitals crumble

Maduro might have been ameliorate off handing the Petros straight to Venezuelan Hospitals, nigh of which are reportedly sick-equipped to cope with the coronavirus pandemic. An April 1 Vice report describing soap and disinfectant as "luxuries" at the Caracas Academy Hospital.

With the facility already experiencing shortages of protective equipment, many of its staff are expecting the hospital to chop-chop become overwhelmed equally the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases grows.

"My fear is that nosotros won't have supplies next calendar week when cases are expected to spike," said the university'due south head of infectious diseases, Maria Landaeta.