Haiti Quake Updates

Raymond C. Offenheiser, Oxfam America’s president, recounts his impressions of the ravaged Haitian capital after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake struck the city leaving 230,000 people dead and more than one million others homeless.

I arrived in Port-au-Prince on the one-month anniversary of the ghastly earthquake that rocked Haiti to its core.  The airport was hectic, full of UN officials, aid workers and military personnel frantically working to move goods and people, struggling to coordinate and manage their own stress in face of the monumental task that confronted them.

Collasped buidlings everywhere

As we left the airport, the scale of the tragedy unfolded: block after block of collapsed buildings and 500,000 people living in ramshackle shelters. Some had tents. Some had the familiar blue sheeting, and others had nothing more than bed sheets. Disposable cups, plastic bags and every other kind of trash formed piles on the perimeter as overtaxed sanitation workers tried to manage the exploding scale of this human refuse.

Much of this story has been told, but I was privileged to witness a new beginning.  An effort by an entire nation to confront and accept an unspeakable level of grief.

Around town, small churches overflowed with men in suits and ties, women in white dresses and their best hats, and preachers exhorting their faithful to sing, chant, grieve and embrace.

Young voices lead the call

At the Oxfam office, I met with colleagues who told me of the many dimensions of the humanitarian response taking place. All the while, a small religious choir two doors down sang, and sang and sang. Their rhythm set the tone for my entire afternoon and evening, never stopping for more than a few seconds. Young voices led the call and a small organ provided a trace of a melody.

It was hauntingly beautiful and seemed to provide the necessary inspiration for our Oxfam team. Not only had they lost two colleagues, but many of them had lost family and friends as well. Still, they did not stop to mourn. They carried on as they had since the minute the quake hit.

At Our Lady of Perpetual Help parish the next morning, Father Fredrick told me that he was preparing to open the front door of his church for a 5 p.m. service when the quake struck. While he was able to flee, another colleague froze in her tracks and did not make it to the door. Like many heroes in Port-au-Prince, he immediately took over an empty lot across from the church and turned it into a gathering place for parishioners to find solace in the company of their neighbors.  In short order, they had organized a community group of 125 families, arranging shelter, water and hygiene services. Families posted their names and new addresses on their makeshift shelters and began to cope with their new reality.

At another small empty lot up the street, another 300 parishioners gathered around a woman who led them in prayer, reflection and singing.  Men, women and children swayed to the music with both hands over their heads. As I surveyed the crowd, I was drawn to the sight of a solitary man, probably in his 70s, who stood alone away from the group, hands over his head, swaying in his own private space.   What was his loss, I wondered. A wife of many years? Children? Grandchildren?

Around the city, I witnessed community-wide efforts to come together to cope. But how can an entire nation that was struggling before the quake recover from such devastating collective trauma?  Is it possible for a country to go through a public and collective process of grief management?

The healing has begun

A Haitian psychologist told me about her efforts to initiate some trauma counseling with students at the university that is now a pile of rubble. She told me that many students, laborers and friends she has worked with share the same experience of falling asleep thinking they are in a nightmare, hoping that when they wake up, things are back to what they were. She confessed that this is happening to her as well. She and her husband were still sleeping in the garden in front of their house.  Yet deep down, each of them knows it will not end. It must be endured.

She believes that the experience of processing this trauma will be different for each person, given where they are in their lives and what resources they have. But all of them will count on hope to keep them going.

On the last day of mourning, people took their grief to the streets in a show of renewal and life. Everywhere you turned, there were processions of hundreds of people marching, singing, and waving leafy green branches. Men in suits and ties, women in their finest, children in fluffy dresses of all colors. Renaissance on the streets of Port-au-Prince. The work goes on, but the healing has begun.

Oxfam has now reached more than 200,000 Haitians with relief, and hopes to reach 500,000 in the first six months of our humanitarian response.

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Oxfam's response to the Haiti earthquake

Map of Oxfam's relief work in Haiti

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ActionAid has set up a regular feeding programme in Haiti for more than 15,000 people and will reach another 12,000 in the coming days.

ActionAid has been able to roll out the food distributions with its partner COZPAM in six camps in the Mariani area of Port-au-Prince %u2013 one of the poorest areas of the city %u2013 despite the huge logistical challenges.

The food distributions are taking place every two weeks and each family gets enough nutritious food to last until the next delivery. These distributions will continue for at least another two months.

ActionAid Country Director in Haiti, Jean Claude Fignole, said: %u201COur food aid programme has been going for three weeks now and we have also starting giving out blankets and kitchen sets.

%u201CThe process has been with the full participation of the community and we have given extra help to vulnerable groups like pregnant women, the disabled and the elderly. We work with grassroots organisations which is why we have been able to reach people in a dignified way.%u201D

In addition ActionAid will this week begin delivering food aid to 12,000 people in Jacmel in the south east of the country, which was also hard hit by the earthquake. With partner CROSE we are also planning to give out seeds and tools in Jacmel before the planting season starts in March.

Jean Claude Fignole continued: %u201COur next focus will be on providing shelter ahead of the rainy season in March, helping children get back to school and people get back to work. Another important element of our work will be trauma healing for those who have lost loved ones and been left in shock by the earthquake.%u201D

ActionAid will also be working on the protection of women in the camps and work is also planned in areas which were less affected by the earthquake but have seen an influx of people from the areas which were harder hit.

ActionAid has so far raised more than �5 million for relief and rehabilitation work in Haiti.

Donate now to the ActionAid appeal

FOREIGN aid workers in Haiti are paying locals $US5 a day to clear rubbish off the streets in a scheme that recalls a great Australian school yard tradition - the emu parade.

One month after Haiti's devastating earthquake, miraculous stories of survival amid the ruins are giving way to more mundane concerns, such as getting locals into jobs and cleaning up a country teeming with scraps and plastic bottles.

The so-called ''cash-for-aid'' program hopes to tackle both challenges together in the early stage of a recovery plan that has an ambitious goal to eventually put more than 200,000 people into temporary work.

''There is a real need for people to get their lives back together,'' Alex Yiannopoulos, an emergency worker with Oxfam International, said from Haiti. ''People want to be occupied, to be doing something useful and this helps keep them motivated.''

Rather than relying solely on typical relief programs, such as handing out tents, blankets and food, the goal of cash-for-aid is to kick-start the local economy.

Mr Yiannopoulos said markets around the ruined capital of Port-au-Prince were now well stocked with fresh fruit and vegetables, along with staples such as rice. But the problem was that locals lacked money to buy the produce.

Oxfam has so far employed about 2000 Haitians to pick up a backlog of light household rubbish at the $US5 wage mandated by the government.

Heavy rubble and sewerage is left alone to be cleared by specialist teams.

The UN Development Program chief, former New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark, told The Age that about 35,000 Haitians were now engaged in similar cash-for-work roles, with plans to expand the scheme to 220,000 workers.

''People have the dignity to get their own money to buy food rather than standing around in queues waiting for a handout,'' Ms Clark said.

Mr Yiannopoulos said the next phase of the Oxfam program was to provide cash grants to small traders and bring local business back to life.

Stone masons and carpenters would be in high demand as the rebuilding started but services such as barber shops would also be needed, he said.

The official death toll for the January earthquake this week topped 230,000, higher than the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.

Pledges of foreign aid continue to stream into the country. The Australian government has promised $15 million towards Haiti's recovery and Australians have privately donated more than $17 million to the relief effort, according to the Australian Council for International Development.

Mr Yiannopoulos said security in Haiti remained fragile but there had been few repeats of looting of aid convoys seen in the first days after the disaster.

''The Haitian people are resilient. Year after year they have shocks - hurricanes, mud slides. This is a particularly bad one, but people want to work, they want to help,'' he said.

With CHARLOTTE KING

The Haitian people have begun tackling the hard work of recovery. Many are eager to contribute, looking for opportunities to earn money and to meet peoples basic needs.

Oxfam is employing people affected by the Haiti quake to clean up their makeshift camps, build latrines and assemble "family kits".

Read more about Oxfam's response to the earthquake in Haiti: http://www.oxfam.org/haitiquake

Camp residents have little official information about plans to re-site camps

Port-au-Prince, Haiti: Less than a third of people living in one of the largest camps in Port au Prince say that they are willing to move to camps sited outside the city according to a snap-shot survey carried out by international agency Oxfam. If the new improved camps are established close to where they used to live then the proportion willing to move leaps to nearly three quarters.

The survey also revealed that there is little official public information available about plans to move people to new camps. Whilst 63 per cent had heard of the Government plans to resettle people, none had heard it directly from the Government and none had been consulted.

Some 13 per cent of people had heard of the plans from friends, 10 percent from the local radio and just one per cent had heard it from non-governmental organizations.

People surveyed said that any new camp would have to provide the very basics of housing, food, water and medical services as well as employment and schools.

“Living conditions of people in the camps need to be rapidly improved. Many of the current sites will not suitable due to the coming raining seasons which, without adequate drainage and sanitation, threatens to wash away shelters and cause health hazards”, said Marcel Stoessel, Oxfam’s Head of Emergency in Haiti.

Stoessel: “If new camps are set-up then people should be not be forced to go. The camps should be safe to reduce criminality and protect vulnerable groups such as women and children. They should also be seen as temporary solutions not end up as long term slums outside the city limits.”

According to Oxfam there is still no clarity on plans to re-site new camps and there needs to be meaningful consultation with camp residents so that they can make informed decisions.

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See larger version of before/after image of the former Petionville Golf Course, where Oxfam is using the irrigation system of the golf course to distribute water around the camp

Oxfam's response to the Haiti earthquake on a map

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Donate now to the Oxfam Haiti Earthquake Response Fund

In the three weeks since an earthquake devastated the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince, the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) has reached nearly 1 million people with much-needed food assistance. About 300,000 of them received aid within the last three days, thanks to a new distribution system that has allowed WFP to reach earthquake victims in a faster, more efficient manner.

In the new system, beneficiaries are given coupons marked with a specific date and location where they can exchange the coupon for a 55 pound bag of rice. The rice is meant to last for about two weeks. According to WFP, the coupons are targeted "primarily [at] female heads of household, as women are usually the first to be pushed out of line if people get hungry and desperate at food distributions." When women receive the rice, it is more likely to be distributed among other family members. 

WFP is also targeting orphanages and hospitals to reach the most vulnerable people affected by the earthquake. About 370 orphanages, home to up to 37,000 children, are receiving highly nutritious supplements in addition to high energy biscuits to prevent malnutrition, which can have devastating effects later in life.

WFP hopes to reach 2 million Haitians with bags of rice in the next two weeks, and the agency is currently making an assessment of food needs which will help it plan for more distributions once this scale-up operation is completed.

-Alli Bailey
Communications Assistant
Friends of WFP

Funds still needed to help Haiti recover and rebuild over years

International agency Oxfam said today that public generosity had secured enough money to fully fund its immediate emergency work in Haiti over the next six months. Oxfam said it is keeping its national appeals open for people to donate toward its longer-term plans to help Haitians to recover and rebuild their lives, over approximately the next three-to-five years.

Oxfam’s 14 independent affiliate groups have raised nearly $90 million in their home markets. The group intends spending around $18 million of this within the next six months. Oxfam is still increasing its aid effort in Haiti to reach more and more people. So far it has reached 85,000 people with water and sanitation and temporary shelter and plans over the on-coming days to reach up to 25,000 more. Oxfam is also giving people cash for clearing up their neighborhood and digging latrines and handing out essential hygiene kits.

Oxfam says that the longer-term needs will be great given the scale of destruction and the level of pre-existing poverty in Haiti. “We are putting our priority on reaching as many more people with emergency assistance and we are also planning for longer-term rebuilding,” said Oxfam’s humanitarian director Fernando Almansa.

“This will involve helping to rehabilitate water and sanitation systems in poorer urban neighborhoods. We will also look at appropriate ways of helping people to increase their food production in sustainable ways. We will help local communities to have a voice in how the government and the international community go about rebuilding Haiti.”

Oxfam said that due to the scale of the devastation and the level of poverty in Haiti it will take a great deal of aid sustained over many years before the people of Haiti recover from this disaster.

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Donate now to the Oxfam Haiti Earthquake Response Fund

Email the IMF to get them to Drop Haiti's Crippling Debt

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About Oxfam's emergency response in Haiti

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Oxfam is providing clean drinking water, sanitation and shelter, currently aiming to reach more than 100,000 people in Haiti (27 Jan 2010).

More about Oxfam's response to the earthquake in Haiti: http://www.oxfam.org/haitiquake

It was a relief to read the sign on the wall: no dead bodies after 3.30 pm. My watch showed it was 4pm. Thankfully, when I poked my head into the morgue at the Hôpital Universitē de l’Ētat de Haiti, also known as the General Hospital, the room was empty.

Outside, though, the ground was grimly sticky underfoot – a reminder of how many bodies had been taken to the public morgue for disposal since the earthquake that struck Haiti nearly two weeks ago.

I’d come to the public hospital, one of the largest  in Haiti, to look at the work Oxfam had been doing there. My colleague, Karine Deniel, a public health specialist, focussing on preparedness and emergency response work, had been called to the hospital the week before.

She had been visibly shocked by what she saw: the hospital was packed with more than 1,000 patients, many of whom were surgery cases. There was no running water and no electricity.

Outside the morgue, she said, piles of bodies wree laid out covered with flies. There was no water close by for doctors to make plaster casts for those with broken limbs; and water she saw in a bucket used to mop the floor was black. “It smelled bad; it smelt of death”, she said.

Oxfam installed a 5,000 liter water bladder in the hospital, and also trucked water to the site so that soiled surgery clothes and bedding could be washed, the kitchen could re-open, and workers in the morgue could wash down the floors, and lessen the putrefying sickly smell of corpses.

“Oxfam has helped”, said Hencia Josena, one of the laundrywomen. “Before we had no water, no soap.”

Staff told me nothing could be washed in the hospital after the earthquake struck until Oxfam trucked in water more than a week later. “Before Oxfam came it was a mess,” said laundry operator, Jean-Robert Deus. “In the surgery room, doctors had blood stains over their clothes.”

Many patients still remain outside the main hospital buildings, many of which were badly destroyed, being treated in tents. They’re scared to go indoors, for fear of after-shocks.

The dedication of staff working there both impressed and humbled me. From the laundry washers, to the kitchen staff, to the steady stream of volunteer medics like George Williams, from New York City, who works in the triage area.

“As bad as things are, this is the best humanitarian effort that I have ever seen,” he told me, also praising the “phenomenal” Haitian doctors he had worked with. “It’s the spirit, the humanitarian effort reaching out from all over the world.”

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Donate now to our Haiti Earthquake Response Fund

Email the IMF to get them to Drop Haiti's Crippling Debt

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About Oxfam's emergency response in Haiti

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Six Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) cargo planes loaded with vital medical material like antibiotics have been redirected to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. This will delay MSF staff's ability to treat patients who urgently need it.