haiti update - april 11, 2010

“Who is like the Lord our God, the One who sits enthroned on high, who stoops down to look on the heavens and the earth? He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap.” Psalm 113:5-7

Hi! This week was a busy one with the medical program. Dr. Karen McCarthy and her team held 5 clinics; 3 here at Coram Deo, 1 in Petionville and 1 in Cite Soleil. They saw and treated around 1,200 patients. We give the Lord thanks for medical teams who continue to come to Haiti helping to provide medical care. Because so many people are living outside in unclean environments people are more susceptible to infections. There are also a lot of cases of untreated diabetes and high blood pressure. The team was able to provide these medicines. They also came with eyeglasses too.
A young mother came with her 2 young children. They lost their home in the earthquake and now live in the outdoor market of Delmas 31, which is the street next to ours. She is going blind because of untreated cataracts in both eyes. We took her to the eye clinic at International Child Care on Delmas 31 and the doctor referred her to an American eye surgeon working out of General Hospital. She will go there on Tuesday. Pray she will be able to get surgery to save her eyesight.
At the clinics several amputees came looking for help in obtaining prosthetics. The handicapped association in Cite Soleil is very organized. We are working with the leaders to hopefully improve their situation. The leaders will compile a list of all members of their organization who need prosthetics and then we will approach Handicapped International for assistance. One of the men lost both of his legs as a result of an accident. If he can get prosthetics he will be able to walk again. Some of the people are in need of wheelchairs. The wheelchairs that they have are old and starting to break. The leaders are determined not to let their handicaps prevent them from participating in Haitian society. They want to start work programs. We told them about making briquettes from paper as a fuel source. They are interested in this idea. Pray work groups can be set up inside Cite Soleil for the handicapped.
When we hold medical clinics inside Cite Soleil, I always like to show the visitors the Cite Soleil Beach. The team had sandals and goodies to hand out to the children and asked me if it would be alright to hand them out there. I told them that would be a good idea. We got to the wharf area and parked the vehicles. When the people nearby saw the visitors carrying the bags they started following and by the time we got to the “beach” there was a crowd of women, children and young men. Dr. Karen told everyone to form a line but instead of forming a line they sort of swarmed the visitors. The young men and women were the most aggressive. It didn’t take long for “hockey fights” to start except it was more like a “bench clearing brawl”. Dr. Karen had removed the stitches from Zulu’s face earlier that were a result of being cut by a broken bottle in a prior fight and here he was again fighting. Poor Zulu. None of the visitors got hurt and I hope that they won’t be scared off at entering Cite Soleil again. It was amazing how desperate the people were to get a pair of flip-flop sandals! Pray that the Haitian people learn to wait patiently in line. It sure makes distributions difficult by not doing this!
Some people delay in seeking medical care. Mackenson, who used to be a teacher here at Coram Deo, now lives in Fond Verettes, which is in the mountains along the Dominican border. He called me earlier in the week about a man who had a problem with his leg. On Friday afternoon Mackenson brought the family to Port-au-Prince. Wisner had the smell of gangrene about him. His left foot was starting to rot. Somebody in his village had cut two of his toes off with a razor blade. I asked Mackenson why the family waited so long to seek out medical care. The family believed that someone had put a “fetish” (voodou curse) on Wisner and they consulted a “hougan” (witchdoctor). Maybe it was the “hougan” who cut off the toes with a razor blade. It was good that Mackenson was able to convince the family to seek out medical care with a real doctor. We brought Wisner over to the Medecins Sans Frontieres Hospital on Delmas 31 and they admitted him. Pray for Wisner and for those who are treating him.
Beverley Oda, the International Co-operation Minister from Canada recently visited Haiti. She announced that the Canadian government will be providing 20 million$ in funding to help to build a hospital in Gonaives. 18.1 million$ will be provided for construction of the National Police Academy in Ganthier, for infrastructure and also equipment to train the Haitian National Police. 16.5 million$ will go towards training and professional development of senior officers. It looks like projects are being allocated outside of Port-au-Prince with the purpose of developing other areas and de-centralizing activities within Port-au-Prince. Pray for security in Haiti. It makes it difficult to do relief and development work if the security situation deteriorates.
The Canadian government is also providing 65.15 million$ in funding through the Canadian Red Cross. 40.92 million$ of this funding will be used for temporary lodgings for 15,000 families affected by the earthquake. Now that immediate medical, food and water needs have been addressed the big push is on for shelter.
After the earthquake in Port-au-Prince a lot of people relocated with family members in other areas. In the Grand Anse region of the country it is estimated that population levels have increased 30% in that area. It is estimated that 120,000 people from Port-au-Prince evacuated to this area.
The last 3 evenings we have had rain every night. Rainy season is beginning. Life in the refuge camps is made very difficult when it rains. The American military has prepared a site 20km north of Port-au-Prince in an area called Corail as a temporary camp for the homeless of Port-au-Prince. 7 refuge camps have been designated as danger areas in times of rain and prone to flooding and land slides. People will need to be removed from those areas. One of these areas are parts of the Petionville Golf Club refuge camp. The Corail camp is preparing to initially hold 8,000 people from the Petionville Golf Club site and transfers started on the weekend. One incentive given to encourage people to move is a payment of $50US to be given to those who stay in the new Corail refuge camp for 2 weeks. Richard Holt recently came to Haiti with 6,000 tents. He brought most of them to the Petionville camp. He told me that these tents would be given to families who leave the Petionville camp as an incentive to transfer to the Corail camp. Pray for the transfers and for the development of the new camp.
The Haitian government is trying to take back some of the public areas. One of these areas is the Sylvio Cator Soccer Stadium. After the earthquake 7,000 people camped out on the artificial turf of the stadium. Friday night the Haitian police arrived and started to forcefully remove people from the stadium. People were not given an alternative location to live. The government of Taiwan will help in restoring the stadium for soccer once again. Pray for all those displaced people who are now searching for another place to set up camp.
That’s all the news for today. Have a good week!
Karen Bultje, Coram Deo