Every day, Haitian Civil Protection is forced to revise upward the ghoulish counts of the 7.2 magnitude earthquake that struck southwestern Haiti at 8:29 am on Saturday. The new assessment, communicated on Monday afternoon, is 1,419 dead and more than 6,900 injured. In addition, more than 37,000 homes were destroyed.
The aid is still active in search of the missing or stranded under the ruins, in the face of a storm that threatens to further aggravate the situation. Tropical Depression Grace indeed poses the risk of flooding and landslides in Haiti and the neighboring Dominican Republic, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center warned.
In the small coastal city of Port-Salut, as in the rest of the affected regions, residents faced a dilemma on Monday: stay outside to protect themselves from aftershocks or enter damaged buildings to protect themselves from the expected severe weather. The city hospital has decided: we must try to protect the patients who have huddled in the courtyard, under plastic sheeting, since the earthquake. In the middle of the day on Monday, the patients were transferred inside the establishment despite the fear of aftershocks.
Along with nurses caring for the injured, Aline Cadet, a 26-year-old midwife, is undermined by the announcement of the weather reports. “Psychologically, we are not well. We do not know at all how we will manage, ”he snapped. “There are pregnant women here, some have lost their babies due to falls or injuries,” he laments.
Many countries, including the United States, the Dominican Republic, Mexico and Ecuador, have offered their help with the dispatch of personnel, emergency rations and medical equipment. The US Army announced on Monday the establishment of a joint military mission, with the deployment of a team in charge of evaluating the situation in the affected areas thanks to aerial observation means. Aerial images taken by US crews “will help determine what help is needed, where and when,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said.
“We want to give a more adequate response than in 2010 after the earthquake. All foreign aid must be coordinated by the Civil Protection Directorate ”, for his part, the Haitian Prime Minister, Ariel Henry, demanded this Sunday, while calling his fellow citizens to“ national unity ”. The earthquake of January 12, 2010, of magnitude 7, left more than 200,000 dead, more than 300,000 injured and more than 1.5 million people homeless.
