Vera Juarez

Dr Vera Juarez was a surgeon at City General Hospital in the 21st century and an associate of the Torchwood team. She was also Rex Matheson's lover and his personal doctor/spy for info gathering.

Biography

Early life

Vera Juarez came from San Antonio (TV: Immortal Sins) and had a brother. (TV: End of the Road) She became a doctor at City General Hospital in Washington DC and had a failed marriage with a man who worked at Cedarbrook (TV: The New World) and who called her asking for drugs and sex after their divorce. (TV: Rendition)

Vera was friends with a woman who worked at the Royal Free Hospital in London. (TV: The New World) In 2010, Vera had to make the difficult decision to let her mother die after she suffered a massive stroke. (TV: Dead of Night)

The Miracle

On 19 March 2011, Vera learnt that there had been no deaths at City General, St Jude's, Cedarbrook or the Royal Free Hospital and was able to treat Rex Matheson's otherwise fatal injury as a result of the Miracle, which she told Esther Drummond about when she visited him. She protested against Victor Louis Santini removing the head of a suicide bomber at a session where she briefly met Jack Harkness and later failed to prevent Rex from leaving the hospital on account of the severity of his injuries. (TV: The New World)

Vera realised that the hospital's usual procedure had to be reversed to free up beds and joined a medical panel to discuss the response to the Miracle after hearing that the Dean of Medicine had gone to one despite having no knowledge of how what was happening. She deduced that the mass production of painkillers would have to begin immediately and attracted the attention of Jilly Kitzinger, who gave her a sample of PhiCorp painkillers and advised her to petition for access to surplus drugs reserved for the civil defence programme. After getting the help of her panel to assist Rex and Gwen Cooper in creating EDTA to save Jack's life aboard an aeroplane over the Atlantic Ocean, she took the painkillers to Rex at the airport. (TV: Rendition)

Later on, Rex, who had joined Torchwood, broke into Vera's house for help, as his wound was getting worse. Rex noted that their relationship was mutual blackmail, which was he found arousing. Despite the fact she was exhausted, Vera gave in and they had sex; it ended up helping Vera clear her head from all the stress Miracle Day gave her. He then offended her, causing her to throw him out of her house, but later decided to help him infiltrate PhiCorp. (TV: Dead of Night)

She later witnessed Ellis Hartley Monroe and Oswald Danes battle it out for popularity, which disgusted her. (TV: Escape to LA)

Death

After the new categories of life were released and the medical panels were disbanded, Vera decided to join Torchwood — a rag-tag band made up of ex-Torchwood Three and ex-CIA members — to stop the Miracle. Vera went under cover inspecting an overflow camp, despite Rex's concerns, but was shot at the leg and the shoulder and put into a module with Category 1 individuals by Colin Maloney after threatening to prosecute him for not looking after the patients in the overflow camp correctly. The modules were actually ovens and the Category 1 patients were being burnt alive. Maloney switched on the module, burning alive all the patients, including Vera. (TV: The Categories of Life)

Legacy

Vera's death was later exposed by Rex and Esther following their escape from the camp. While this prompted the White House to launch an official investigation into the San Pedro camp, the policy for handling category ones was left unchanged. (TV: The Middle Men)

Vera was survived by her brother, who received a phone call from Rex Matheson, expressing his condolences. (TV: End of the Road)