Many have queued overnight, waiting patiently for the Simón BolÃvar International bridge to open. Some 25,000 people cross the bridge into Colombia every day.
Venezuela is suffering from acute shortages of medicines, hospitals struggle to treat patients and staple goods have become scarce and unaffordable to many.
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Mothers cradle their babies, bringing them to the hospital in the town of Cúcuta, on the Colombian side of the border, to get them vaccinated.
Families push poorly relatives in wheelchairs. Others cross into Colombia with empty suitcases, filling them up with food and supplies they cannot get in Venezuela.
Two women with a baby in a pushchair walk past the border guard, muttering: "What a humiliation." They are clearly embarrassed they have to do this.
Crossing the border for food
The local church in Cúcuta is feeding between 600 and 2,000 people a day in an open-air courtyard filled with plastic tables and chairs.
The two women travel two hours every day from Venezuela to sell fruit at a market in Colombia.
They cannot find work back home. They come here for their only proper meal of the day.
"Look at the weight I've lost," says Mariluz, grabbing her once fleshy arms and showing the loose skin. "I used to be healthy and strong. But we have to walk such a long way and work so hard."
Mariluz's case is not rare. Recent research [in Spanish] suggests that three-quarters of Venezuelans lost weight in the past year, an average of 9kg (20lb).
Living on the streets
The Colombian government recently introduced "border mobility cards" to allow Venezuelans to go back and forth across the border without the need for a passport.
But some like Carlos Alberto Ledesma, a professional jazz musician from Caracas, want to stay in Colombia for good.
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