JUAREZ, Mexico (Border Report) – Venezuela still was a prosperous country when Oswaldo Hernandez Tabata visited Cuba in the 2000s to further his dentistry studies. He heard good things about that country’s health system but was disturbed by how the communist government restricted people’s lives.

“I was in Havana and saw certain things and told myself, ‘This will never happen in Venezuela,’” he said.

A few years later, socialist Hugo Chavez began expropriating thousands of private companies, forced producers to sell below cost, fired experienced administrators and appointed cronies to run the government. Corruption grew as did shortages of basic goods. Oil exports plummeted, and the Venezuelan economy collapsed.

Chavez died but his right-hand-man Nicolas Maduro took over in 2013. The sho

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