Desperate Venezuelans were forced to turn to filthy sewage drains and polluted rivers as the country’s nearly weeklong power outage left many without water.

“I’ve never even seen this before. It’s horrible, horrible,” said Lilibeth Tejedor, 28, one of dozens who flocked to a drain pipe that runs into a river carrying sewage through the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, Reuters reported.

“The ones that are most affected are the children, because how do you tell a child that there’s no water?” said Tejedor, the mother of a 2-year-old, as she filled a 4-gallon plastic container to take to her San Agustin neighborhood.

People collecting water from the pipe said it had been released from reservoirs by local authorities — but was so dirty, it could be used only to flush toilets and wash floors.

Meanwhile, conditions throughout the country continued to deteriorate, to the point that 10 people close to President Nicolàs Maduro tried to enter Colombia seeking relief from the heat.

Maduro’s cousin Argimiro Maduro applied for himself, his wife and children to be allowed to travel to Riohacha, Colombia, and remain there until power is restored.

But Colombia recently compiled a list of more than 300 people linked to the president who are barred from entering the country.

Officials in Colombia — which like the United States and more than 20 other countries recognizes opposition leader Juan Guaidó as Venezuela’s rightful president — said they won’t allow Maduro’s family to seek refuge there while “avoiding the reality of a people in agony.”

Venezuela’s chief prosecutor, Tarek William Saab, said Tuesday that he has launched a probe into suspicions Guaidó was involved in an attack on the country’s power grid. The grid failed last Thursday, leaving most of the nation in the dark and with limited phone and Internet service.

Guaidó and the US blame years of mismanagement and corruption for the collapse of the infrastructure in the once-wealthy, oil-rich country.

Also Tuesday, Maduro gave US diplomats 72 hours to get out.

And EU foreign-policy chief Federica Mogherini said no military action from inside or outside Venezuela would be acceptable to resolve the deteriorating situation.

She told the UN Security Council that “a solution cannot be, and should never be, imposed from the outside.”

Mogherini added that “an international initiative can help build a peaceful and democratic way out of the crisis.”

Additional reporting by Bob Fredericks and Wires