It also shut down all schools, closed the frontiers between Venezuela and its neighbors, and put six states and Caracas as quarantine. Marinez was stranded in OSRS gold transit and holed up at his uncle's home in a city that was fifty miles from Caracas' capital.

Two months later, Marinez came back to Maracaibo, "without any money in my pockets," he said. He tried to find work but was unable to find one in the job market that was destroyed due to the pandemic. It also led to a prolonged economic recession.

Ten years prior, Venezuela, a petrostate under the leadership of Hugo Chavez, witnessed a slump in the price of oil. in 2017, the cost of a barrel plummeted to around $50, down from a high of over $100 in addition, The U.S. instituted wide-ranging sanctions against the Venezuelan dictatorship.

"When oil prices started to decline and the country was left with no funds to import goods," said Alejandro Velasco, a professor at New York University who specializes in Venezuelan politics, in a phone interview. "As a result there was no money to support the economy."

The Venezuelan coffers were already empty after it spent its most recent oil wealth on social services such as subsidised food, medical care, in addition to literacy initiatives. Chavez also exiled perceived dissenters in the oil industry an buy OSRS GP attempted military coup affecting production.

The widespread corruption within the state has harmed the economy, according to Paul Angelo, a fellow at the Council for Foreign Relations who is an expert on Latin American politics.