Haiti Earthquake Relief

By: James Addis, Senior Editor World Vision Magazine

Today, I am working from a comfortable office. Six months ago, I was on a plane to Haiti to report on one of the worst earthquakes in human history—one that killed more than 220,000 people. My work environment there included overcrowded hospitals and hastily set-up displaced people’s camps that lacked water and sanitation.

One question I was sometimes asked after returning home was: “How did Haiti affect you personally?” That’s not easy to say. There was a range of emotions. Some experiences were heartbreaking. I’ll never forget the corpses of children lying in the streets and the people trying to dig relatives out of the rubble using small crowbars and flimsy hacksaws.

Six months after Haiti’s devastating earthquake, much has been done to help the people of Haiti, but the road to lasting recovery will take many years. As aid groups transition from relief to recovery efforts, providing sturdy, safe shelter to survivors is one of the most pressing and complex challenges now facing aid workers. With hurricane season already underway, better shelter is also one of the most urgent needs for families.

“Our relief efforts continue at full pace, providing clean water, education for children, temporary shelter, job training and more. However, the long-term needs of Haiti remain daunting. Our priority now is getting transitional shelters up and doing all we can prepare for hurricane season,” said Ton van Zutphen, World Vision's response director.

World Vision, is concerned that the upcoming hurricane season in Haiti could create a secondary disaster for Haitians and urges the Government of Haiti and the international community to include disaster risk reduction activities in its long-term rebuilding plans.

“While we continue to focus on the earthquake relief efforts in Haiti, we must prepare ourselves for the possibility of another disaster as the hurricane season approaches,” said Jean-Claude Mukadi, World Vision’s relief response manager in Haiti. “While we can’t prevent disasters like earthquakes and floods, we must focus on preventing the effects of these disasters on those at risk in Haiti.”

In 2008, Haiti was hit by four severe hurricanes, leaving the country struggling to recover. Haitians are exposed to growing and complex threats that result from natural disasters, high levels of poverty, severe environmental degradation, and increased vulnerability.

Multiple studies have shown that the economic cost of investing in disaster preparedness and disaster risk reduction is far less then the cost of dealing with the aftermath. In fact, some estimate that for every dollar spent on risk reduction, at least four dollars are saved.

For people displaced by the Port-au-Prince earthquake, healthcare is at the same time one of the biggest priorities and one of the biggest challenges. Knowledge of risks is limited, access to treatment disrupted, and basic illnesses can become life-threatening. Children are especially vulnerable to disease; living in crowded and cramped conditions, their health symptoms often go unnoticed by adults who are focused on other aspects of family recovery or protection.

Parc Acra, a displacement camp of around 4000 residents, was hastily assembled on a hill in the first few days after the quake. Most of them have been there since. Nearly half of them are children, and new babies are being born every day. What happens in this community is a fair representation of what is happening in 600 other camps across Port-au-Prince.

But there is a difference here. World Vision’s health and sanitation interventions – a clinic, household visits from a health and hygiene team, water delivery and special services for new mothers – are facing up to the challenges. Here are some of the simple tools they use.

Nutrition
Mirjo Hyppolite returned to her home country of Haiti from the US as a newlywed in late 2009. With qualifications in nutritional health, she set up her own clinic and began happily planning for the rest of her life.

World Vision videographer Tom Costanza reflects on his time in Haiti a few months ago.

I don’t even know where to start. So I guess I’ll start at the end.

Haiti was the kind of experience that changes your understanding of how desperate people can be and how unselfishly others can respond. By the time I left, I was sure I was different. I was definitely more tired. I weighed less. But I also felt that, mentally, I’d reached some kind of turning point. Whatever it was, I began to feel, more deeply than I had in some time, that all I’d seen and heard—the cries of injured children, the pleas of helpless mothers, the anger of people who’d lost everything—was weighing on me, more than it had since I first started in television news more than 25 years ago.

By Laura Blank, World Vision disaster communicator

It hasn’t rained here for more than a week, but it rained again in Port-au-Prince last night. Not that torrential, heavy downpour this Caribbean nation is used to experiencing during the rainy season in April and May. Just a steady, slow kind of rain. But it doesn’t matter. The camps are already crowded, difficult places to live. Rain only makes it worse.

Earlier this week, I traveled down from Boston for my third trip to Haiti in the past several months. I had traveled here for work this summer, the time now known as “before.” Then, as part of my job as a disaster communications officer with World Vision, I was deployed to Port-au-Prince almost immediately after the earthquake and spent nearly a month here in January. After returning home for a bit, I found myself back on a plane to Haiti just a few days ago to join up with our relief response team here in the capital.

Dave Toycen, president of World Vision Canada shared about his trip to Haiti with USA Today. The earthquake hit Haiti on Tuesday, Jan. 12 and Dave arrived in the island nation at 10 a.m. that Thursday. You can check out the entire article here.

Port-au-Prince, April 12, 2010 – Three months after the earthquake in Haiti, international relief agency World Vision has provided aid to around 1.8 million people, bringing much-needed aid to affected families throughout the capital city.

“We see small successes every day,” said Liz Satow, deputy response manager for World Vision in Haiti. “Health clinics and mobile health teams are reaching thousands of people. Around 50,000 people in our camps are benefiting from our water and sanitation services. Our Child-Friendly Spaces are attracting around 3,000 children a week.”

Despite these great strides, many quake-affected families are still facing serious risks. The problems they face are complex and interlinked, threatening to create new patterns of vulnerability.

Students from across the country joined with us in an effort to bring support, both through finances and prayer, to the people of Haiti. The response from students has been incredible – thousands of dollars have been raised, and we continue to hear stories of prayer gatherings that have taken place around the U.S. The need is still great and World Vision will continue to be on the ground in Haiti for years to come. Thank you to all of you who have organized events, fundraisers, and prayer gatherings to support our brothers and sisters in Haiti. Below is an update about World Vision’s response to Haiti - your efforts help make this possible!

Celebrating Milestones in Haiti Response: By Nathalie Moberg

World Vision’s Miami Logistics Support Center has shipped 21 sea containers to Haiti to date, providing critical recovery support to families suffering following the January earthquake that devastated the capital city of Port-au-Prince.

By Jane Sutton-Redner, World Vision

First Haiti, now Chile. Here’s how you might pray for people affected by disasters, sparked by daily life moments.

1. Waiting at the drive-through for coffee or fast food, think of people standing in long lines for food distributions. Picture their anxiety—Will there be enough? When this food is gone, what’s next? Pray for a steady supply of food and drinkable water for survivors in their time of need.

2. As you pop a pain reliever or stick a band-aid on a cut, remember people wounded in disasters. Their injuries can become fatal if they’re not treated in time. Pray for doctors and nurses to swiftly help the wounded—especially frightened children—with the right medications and supplies.