Haiti Needs More Cholera Aid

PORT-AU-PRINCE, June 18 (BERNAMA-NNN-PRENSA LATINA) — Humanitarian non-governmental organisation Medecins Sans Frontiers regrets the low international response to Haiti’s request for aid to fight the cholera epidemic.

Medecins Sans Frontiers CEO, Marie-Noalle Rodriguez, said in a press conference Saturday that the health crisis grew worse with the departure of many international agents while her organisation and Cuban doctors were the key actors in Haiti’s anti-cholera drive, and deplored the collapse of a system that hindered reliable data collecting.

The Health Ministry dates the first case on Oct 18, 2010 and 7,260 deaths through June 10.

The Pan-American health organisation has so far treated nearly 10,000 cases over the last six months.

The NGO director Thierry Goffeau claimed that poor finances hurt quality and continuity of services at several facilities particularly in Artibonite (NW), host of the largest number of victims, and where recurrence involved mutation of the virus, according to the U.S. Centre for Disease Control and Prevention.

It expects some 200,000 contagion this year.

Several sources blame the late 2010 massive outbreak to Nepalese staff of UN peacekeeping mission MINUSTAH who tainted the Artibonite River with faeces.

The river is used for agricultural wash, drinking, cooking and bathing and just two percent of its 10 million population have access to drinkable water while the majority use latrines or simply discharge in the open around their homes.

— BERNAMA-NNN-PRENSA LATINA

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