Posted on 09/24/2004 3:41:57 AM PDT by Hillarys Gate Cult
GONAIVES, Haiti -- Hungry, thirsty and increasingly desperate residents attacked each other in a panic to get scarce food and water Thursday as workers struggled to bury hundreds of corpses six days after the city was struck by Tropical Storm Jeanne.
More than 1,100 were killed and 1,250 are missing, and the toll was rising. The storm left 250,000 homeless in Haiti's northwest province, which includes the port of Gonaives.
Health workers feared an epidemic of disease in the country's third-largest city from the unburied dead, overflowing raw sewage, lack of potable water, and infections from injuries. Some people already were falling ill.
Police erected barbed wire around their station Thursday after shots were fired at the station overnight.
Most of the police also were left homeless by the floods and had only one vehicle, and that one wasn't working, officer Louis Francois said. Their helplessness enraged residents, who have started throwing rocks at the few riot police the government sent in to help.
"We were saved from the floods, but now my baby is sick," said Marilucie Fortune, 30, who gave birth to a son in a slum last weekend, as Jeanne pounded Haiti with torrential rain for 30 hours. Jeanne has since become a hurricane, churning toward the Bahamas with 105 mph winds and a track that forecasters say could lead to Florida this weekend.
Haiti's civil protection agency said more than 900 people have been treated for injuries, mostly cuts or gashes from debris. Medics from U.N. peacekeeping troops have pitched in.
The General Hospital -- still knee-deep in mud -- was out of commission, medical supplies are running out, and some aid trucks were unable to reach the city because part of the road was washed away.
Hundreds of people pushed through a wooden barrier to crowd into Gonaives' sole working clinic for treatment, where one doctor was on duty.
Workers dug new mass graves for bodies half-buried in the mud, trapped in collapsed homes or floating in floodwaters that still ran knee-deep in places.
"There are so many bodies, you smell them but you don't see them," said farmer Louise Roland, who like many held a lime to her nose to mask the stench.
Some residents of the seaside slum of Carenage had grown so desperate to get rid of the decaying corpses that they were burying the unidentified victims in their backyards. That could cause yet another health hazard since the bodies easily could be forced up from shallow seaside graves.
"We need surgical masks, water and food," said Frantz Bernier, who was burning tires to protest the lack of government help. "We don't have anything."
By Thursday, 1,105 bodies had been recovered -- the vast majority in Gonaives -- with 1,250 missing and nearly 1,000 injured, according to Dieufort Deslorges, spokesman for the government's civil protection agency.
"It's a critical situation in terms of epidemics, because of the bodies still in the streets, because people are drinking dirty water and scores are getting injuries from debris -- huge cuts that are getting infected," said Francoise Gruloos, Haiti director for the U.N. Children's Fund.
Martine Vice-Aimee, an 18-year-old mother of two whose home was destroyed, said people already were "getting sick from the water."
"They're walking in it, their skin is getting itchy and rashes. The water they're drinking is giving them stomach aches," she said.
Limited distribution by aid workers left most people still hungry and thirsty.
"We can only drink the water people died in," complained farmer Jean Lebrun.
Aid agencies have dry food stocked in Gonaives, but few have the means to cook. Food for the Poor, based in Deerfield, Fla., said its truckloads of relief were unable to reach the city Wednesday. Troops from the Brazilian-led U.N. peacekeeping forcing were ferrying in supplies by helicopter.
Peacekeepers fired into the air Wednesday to keep a crowd at bay as aid workers handed out loaves of bread -- the first food in days for some.
Police said they feared attack by about 20 prisoners who escaped from jail during the storm.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Crescent Societies appealed for $3.3 million to fund relief operations, and several nations were sending help.
The U.S. government will provide more than $2 million in immediate disaster relief to Haiti's flood victims in the coming days, USAID spokesman Jose Fuentes said.
Haiti was especially susceptible to Jeanne's rain-laden system, because more than 98 percent of the land is deforested and torrents of water and mudslides smashed down denuded hills and into the city. Floodwater lines on buildings went up to 10 feet high.
The disaster follows devastating floods in May, along the Haiti-Dominican Republic border, which left 1,191 dead and 1,484 missing in Haiti and 395 dead and 274 missing on the Dominican side. The countries share the island of Hispaniola.
Haiti: Workers hastily digging mass graves
Volunteer with your time and expertise and keep your dollars out of a terrorists pocket. Bet Heinz-Kerry is on the way to save the day...NOT!
Haiti needs prayers - but they needed them before the hurricane hit. Hopefully they'll pull themselves up and try to build an infrastructure before the next hurricane hits. They probably won't though.
Hate to tell yall but while you were debating the effectiveness of number 19 vs 44, the government just gave away 2 million dollars of our money and I would bet it didn't go to the Salvation Army or A Catholic charity. I'm thinking maybe UN or, grrr, the Red Cross. I wonder how much will go directly to the victims.
Anyone know the status of American armed forces stationed in Haiti? How about any info from various missionaries?
PS. Can't believe there's a flame war over charities and Grenada vs. Haiti.
What do you mean by that - a "flame war"?
Flame warrior link may answer your question:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/738646/posts
I know this is a weird discussion - I'm not trying to downplay Haiti by any means.
Many of the deaths in Haiti could have been prevented. All that money the world has poured in could have gone towards infrastructure - sanitation, drainage, distribution networks, etc. But thuggery and corruption have made that impossible.
There is a dysfunctional culture at work in Haiti. The media refuses to address it as such. That would be a nice first step towards really helping the people there.
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