Thousands of earthquake victims in Haiti have been waiting in the midst of rubble for days. Everything is missing, in many places no help has yet arrived. The consequences of the quake and a tropical storm make the situation more difficult.
Les Cayes – Four days after the earthquake in Haiti, which left more than 1900 fatalities, many survivors are still waiting for urgently needed support.
“There is a serious problem with the distribution of aid,” wrote journalist Nancy Roc on Twitter on Wednesday. So far, this has only arrived in the two largest cities in the affected area in the southwest of the Caribbean state – Les Cayes and Jérémie.
The other communities are being neglected, calls for help to the national authorities remain unanswered, reported the newspaper “Le Nouvelliste”. According to reports on social media, there was still a shortage of what was most needed in many places – food and medicine, but also tents.
More victims were added
The number of confirmed fatalities rose again by more than 500 to 1941 on Tuesday, according to Haiti’s civil protection authority. More than 9,900 people were injured, a good 37,000 houses were destroyed and almost 47,000 buildings were damaged. According to Unicef, 1.2 million people were affected by the disaster. Numerous victims were still suspected under the rubble. After all: 16 people were rescued alive on Tuesday.
The 7.2 magnitude quake occurred on Saturday morning (local time) near the municipality of Saint-Louis-du-Sud, east of Les Cayes, at a depth of around ten kilometers. It hit a country where many people live in dire poverty and which is prone to natural disasters.
The earthquake region was devastated by Hurricane “Matthew” in 2016 – more than 500 people died. A 7.0 magnitude earthquake in January 2010, the center of which was near the densely populated capital Port-au-Prince, killed more than 220,000 people. Reconstruction suffered badly from corruption and waste.
Tropical storm made the situation difficult
The chief of civil defense, Jerry Chandler, admitted delays in the distribution of aid supplies on the radio station Magik9, as reported by “Le Nouvelliste”. He justified this with the difficult organization, which had been made even more difficult by the passage of the tropical storm “Grace” on Tuesday night. This had caused floods in some places and affected numerous people who slept outdoors.
Haiti’s already severely underfunded health system has been overstretched by the recently worsening corona pandemic. In addition, there is a deep political crisis that had intensified after the murder of President Jovenel Moïse by a commando in his residence on the night of July 7th. Fights between gangs paralyze parts of the capital Port-au-Prince again and again; according to UN figures, they displaced around 15,000 people in June.
Gangs also control and block the main road to the south of the country. The government and UN representatives have negotiated that two aid convoys are allowed to drive on the road, the UN Agency for the Coordination of Humanitarian Aid (OCHA) announced on Tuesday. On Wednesday, civil protection reported that a convoy of eight trucks was bringing food, water and other important goods to the earthquake area.
The United Nations (UN) pledged eight million US dollars (almost seven million euros) in emergency aid, the European Union (EU) three million euros. Latin American countries also sent relief supplies. dpa
