The poet Pablo Neruda joined the Santa Maria Hospital on September 19, 1973 , the doctor Roberto Vargas Salazar signed the card number " 189,950 " with the following diagnosis : " metastatic cancer " . Neruda underwent two operations in France (1971-1972) , physician and surgeon Francisco Velasco was pending treatments receiving his friend and neighbor of Valparaiso : " The prostate cancer was inoperable , had metastasized to the bones of the pelvis. He made a palliative operation , a size vertically to relieve your discomfort and combat urinary tract infection " ( Neruda. Great Friend , 1987) , Dr. Velasco led to a urologist Neruda Vargas Salazar in 1969 , including a nurse assigned to care the poet in 1973 , knew firsthand the medical record and knew that Neruda received 56 cobalt radiotherapy sessions . The first results of the exhumation on April 8 detected bone metastases.
Moving from Isla Negra Neruda Santiago was scheduled earlier, the driver and assistant Manuel Araya hired an ambulance on September 17 , the idea was to approach the airport in hopes of safe passage to travel to Mexico , Matilde Urrutia said : " professor Vargas Salazar , who attended him , always said that Paul was a very strong man , who was defending beautifully. What to bring to the clinic was mostly for safekeeping and protect " ( Today Magazine , 1979 ) . The widow also reported : " His doctor Valparaiso was arrested on the 13th, so I could not reach . Then I shared with Vargas Salazar , Santiago , and he prescribed me antibiotics that I already had " ( Funeral guarded, 1974 ) . The family doctor and close friend of Neruda , Francisco Velasco was arrested and tortured in the Lebú , the driver Manuel Araya was arrested and tortured at the National Stadium , Secretary and friend of Neruda - Homer - Arce was arrested and tortured by police , the carpenter and restorer of Neruda 's houses Maturana Jaime was arrested and tortured at Villa Grimaldi . As of September 11 the military established a repressive siege against closest collaborators Nobel Prize .
The tour of Isla Negra, Santiago lasted six hours because the military stopped the ambulance at 13 checkpoints , raided the patient and the driver. The Mexican diplomat Corbalá Gonzalo Martinez was the first visit that afternoon Neruda received September 19 , Volodya Teitelboim rebuilt the meeting : "Ambassador Martinez extended his invitation Corbalá at Clinica Santa Maria. Neruda thanked rejecting ... The Ambassador insisted : ' There will have better medical care here. Healthy return ' . Resigned from Neruda " ( Neruda , 1984 ) . Ulf Swedish diplomats and Edelstam Hjertonsson Neruda visited the Santa Maria Clinic on September 22 , Ambassador Edelstam sent a report to the Foreign Office , dated October 8, 1973 : "Despite his serious illness , Neruda spoke about events in Chile and the fate of many of his friends. Although the coup seemed not have been surprised , I was shocked by the brutality of the military. " Historians Fernando Camacho Padilla and Mario Amoros published : " In your cable September 22, 1973 , Edelstam Hjertonsson explained tersely that he and Neruda had visited early in the afternoon and that the poet was ' very ill ' in the clinic, but despite this , he wanted to travel to Mexico on Monday 24 "( the Nación.cl 19/03/2013 ) .
The fate of the poet in exile was the Cancer Institute , the most prestigious public hospitals in Latin America , the flight would leave on September 22 , Neruda decided to reschedule for Monday 24, but died on the eve . The death certificate states that the cause was " cancer cachexia " ( extreme malnutrition syndrome catatonic state ), the medical journal retaken by El Mercurio omitted Neruda Cachexia alleged " victim died last night of a heart attack which caused the death to 22.30 . It was reported that at the time of his death he was accompanied by his wife, Matilde Urrutia , and his sister Laura . The Chilean poet had been hospitalized in serious condition at the clinic said on Saturday ( 22 ) . Following a shock result after having been suffered since their seriousness injection deepened " ( 24/09/1973 ) . El Mercurio de Valparaíso describes more accurately , an allergic reaction: " The low pressure experienced sudden yesterday, after having been given a sedative injection , forced the physician Roberto Vargas Salazar , a distinguished urologist and nephrologist, interconsultation call a cardiologist. ' This is a very important low pressure ' explained the doctor and professor of cardiology, who would not yet identified " ( 24/09/1973 ) . The newspaper Jornal do Brasil does not mention the cause of death as cachexia , according to the report by Paulo Cesar Araujo : " [ Neruda died ] victim of urological infection [ or urinary ] chronic phlebitis, as diagnosed in the afternoon [ on 23 ] the Draper Sergio doctor " ( 9/24/1973 ) .
The September 19, 1973 the dictatorship issued Decree Law No. 20 on the National Health Service and National Health Service Employees , with the new " Decree Law " was named military inspectors who took charge of the key government agencies , private companies and institutions , the " Decree Law " was endorsed on 21 September in the Official Gazette of Chile . Just between the two dates ( 19 and 21 ) started working relationship Dr. Sergio Draper at Santa Maria Hospital , Draper was attending physician for the deaths of Pablo Neruda ( 1973) and Eduardo Frei ( 1982 ) . The contradictions and omissions are evident Draper , in an interview with La Tercera said : "I was not unconscious or asleep , during the afternoon of the day he died -5 hrs. before his death, Neruda said , 'Doctor, I have prostate Amidona rotten ... get me ' " ( 23/09/1975 ) Draper as the patient became comatose and died at 10:30 pm . The journalist interviewed Carolina Rojas Draper : " The treatment was done to Neruda was indicated by Vargas Salazar . The clinic does not do any treatment other than that indicated by the treating physician ... I saw him only a moment on Sunday September 23 , I do not correspond to assist you. That day , the nurse on duty told me that Neruda apparently suffered a lot of pain , I said I would apply the injection prescribed by your doctor , if I remember it was a dipyrone "(Revista Ñ 06/09/2011) . Draper and Dipyrone mistook Amidona with the prescribed medication : Dolopirona .
The difference between dipyrone and Dolopirona is a line of research, Dolopirona is a drug compound, which in addition to containing dipyrone , contains a muscle relaxant that enhances its analgesic - relaxant called Chlormezanone and in any case could not be considered a drug with potential lethal . Instead Dipyrone is prohibited by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA ) in the United States since 1977 is prohibited in Sweden since 1974 and in Germany since 1981. The Dipyrone causes heart in patients, is a potentially lethal drug , unlike Dolopirona , which is a mild pain reliever . The judge asked Mario Chariot " is drawn through the institution DEMERCI a report on Nifedipine , a dihydropyridine or the Bay and Dolopirona 1040 " ( 15/05/2013 ) . This point is crucial , Matilde Urrutia said the injection was Dolopirona ( La Opinion 05/05/1974 ), but the doctor says Sergio Draper was Dipyrone ( Revista Ñ 06/09/2011) . If Draper ordered an injection of dipyrone , disobeyed the instructions of the physician Vargas Salazar , Neruda could die from an allergic reaction to the Dipyrone , or dipyrone overdose . In addition, the Clinic Santa Maria there was no treatment for urinary tract infection that afflicted the poet , no witness - friend of Neruda , or remind nurses that the patient had an intravenous solution ( procedure to broad-spectrum antibiotics ) . 40 years later, toxicology tests from the University of North Carolina (USA ) and the University of Murcia ( Spain ) seek to establish what was injected Neruda afternoon September 23, 1973 .
* Correspondent in Mexico 's "Clarin Chile", a preliminary version of this research was published in the print edition of "Clarin Chile", on September 11, 2013.