Again some information on what is happening in Haiti – most of the thanks for this goes to my friend, Judith, in Port-au-Prince.

The latest figures from the Government of Haïti place the death toll at 212,000 persons (and could go as high as 230,000) with 300,000 persons injured, about 500,000 persons emigrating to the provinces (mostly those directly north and on the southwestern peninsula), and another 700,000 persons in camps or staying at others’ homes (usually courtyards) in Port-au-Prince.

Commercial air flights with American Airlines, is scheduled to begin by the end of this week as the number of relief flights continues to decline.  It is now less than half of what it was, but still a good two times more than the usual number of daily flights before the earthquake.  (The cost, however, of a commercial air flight from PaP to Miami has doubled.  For Dickie to use that method to go home on Monday it will cost him $600 US, for a one way ticket out to Miami.)

Floating docks have been installed at the port and it is expected that up to 1,500 containers will soon be able to be handled per day! This is a great blessing, this is the main route for many supplies into Haïti.

Overland travel is still clogged at the border, but it is generally moving acceptably well.

Camps and smaller sites….Drinking water seems to be in enough abundance, and there has been a ‘surge’ effort to provide two weeks’ worth of staples for women of families.  The present surge will continue for about another week, and already about 1.2 million persons have received food staples (2.3 million since the beginning of food aid)–and now in an orderly fashion, too!  There are stories of families setting up the old ‘lakou‘ system in the camps: one common cooking pot that then feeds several families.  “Where there is a will there is a way.”  That’s the Haitian people!

One of the solutions that is hard to come by is the latrine issue, there are just not enough to go around at the camps–not enough land to plant them on.  Catholic Relief Services has just been funded to help set up some latrines, however, so there will still be at least several more to be built.  Because of this issue, the Shelter Cluster is planning to ‘decongest’ key camp sites, that is, ask for volunteers to move to other locations that they will find.  This will not be an easy undertaking because the families will not want to either move away from their networks nor their homes since many still have their possessions under rubble.

Along with a lack of latrines is the lack of adequate shelter against the spring rainy season that has is about to begin. Actually it rained last night for several hours.  People were soaked and miserable.  Can yoiu imagine all those people in tents lying and shivering in wet clothes.  The tents are not water proof.  On top of the problem of the tents not being watertight, they also require a significant amount of room to be able to be set up, and there simply is not the space.  The organizations are pooling resources to be able to provide at least one tarp per family by 1 May. About one third of the 250,000 families in PAP that are without homes have received either some plastic sheeting or tents, and that number is increasing fairly rapidly.  By Haitian ingenuity, the tarps are also for sale by the street vendor!

Temporary Shelters…Once everyone has protection from the rains, the next step will be to provide temporary housing kits–poles of either wood or metal, plastic sheeting and corrugated iron for the roof.  These shelters are 18m2 (194 sq ft), have an expected lifespan of about 3 years, and will cost about US$1,000-1,500 for a family of five.  The Shelter Cluster is looking for donations to purchase these kits.  Finding enough space for these is another issue.  The Haitian Government is looking at expropriation of land around PAP for temporary settlements–the camps do not have the space for these, as you can imagine.

The organization CHF has hired quite a number of Haitian people to clear rubble, especially around the government buildings downtown.  They are working with another organization to see if the rubble can be crushed and then used in rebuilding.  YEAH!  I’ve been very concerned about what would happen with all this rubble.  It is much more than could be disposed of.

One aspect that will need more reflection, however, is that an intensely populated urban area like Port-au-Prince will not be able to support single family dwellings.  The downtown area is 14.7 sq miles and had over 2 million people living there–that works out to about 136,000 people per sq mile.  Single dwelling homes, especially any larger than these temporary structures, would be impossible.

The newest figures suggest that 3.7 million instead of 3.0 million persons were affected by the earthquake with 1.2 million losing their homes.   I’m not sure any disaster has had to confront this magnitude of population density.

Some of the relief groups are talking about trying to resettle the Port-au-Princians back into the rural provinces.  Unfortunately they are missing a key factor here: all of the jobs are in PAP.  In fact, a large portion of money transfers are actually from within the country and go from PAP to the provinces.  The bottom line: if the folks don’t return, no one will have any money to live on.  The money transfer system is what has kept the Haitian people afloat.

The Haitian people are amazingly resilient.  They have had to deal with, and overcome, disaster after disaster.  What they are trying to cope with right now, however, is more than any of us could imagine dealing with.

Please continue to pray for Haiti and for the aid work to be done God’s  way.  Thank you for what you have done to help.  THANK  YOU!!

~Karen