The need is great in southern Haiti, three days after the quake with more than 1,400 dead. Tens of thousands have lost their homes, and help is slow to arrive. Now a storm also brings heavy rain.
Les Cayes – After the earthquake killing more than 1,400 people, a heavy rain storm swept across the affected area in southern Haiti.
“Grace” strengthened on Tuesday night (local time) according to the US hurricane center from a low pressure area to a tropical storm and moved with sustained wind speeds of around 65 kilometers per hour over the south of the island of Hispaniola, where Haiti and the Dominican Republic are located. Videos on social media showed flooded streets.
On the Tiburon Peninsula, which was badly hit by the earthquake on Saturday and where tens of thousands of people had become homeless, the water was ankle-high in places, as can be seen in the pictures. The residents of the area, many of whom had previously slept outdoors, sought shelter in tents and under tarpaulins, for example.
In the general hospital of Les Cayes damaged by the earthquake – with a population of around 90,000 people, the largest city in the affected area – patients were initially housed in the courtyard. Because of the rain, however, they were brought in, as reported by journalist Frantz Duval on Twitter. “The dilemma this morning: the mud in the open or the cracked building – where better to be protected,” he wrote.
The earthquake’s confirmed death toll rose to 1,419 from Monday, according to Haiti’s civil protection agency. Around 6,900 people were injured – and many are still believed to be in the rubble of destroyed buildings.
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. According to the civil protection authorities, a good 37,000 houses were destroyed and almost 47,000 damaged. According to Unicef, 1.2 million people are affected. The need is great in the area devastated by Hurricane Matthew five years earlier. According to Caritas International, food, drinking water, tents and medical first aid are needed.
In Haiti, America’s poorest country, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake in January 2010 killed more than 220,000 people and left more than a million homeless. Reconstruction suffered badly from corruption and waste.
Missing or damaged infrastructure threatens to impede relief and rescue operations after the new earthquake. The highway that connects the capital Port-au-Prince with Haiti’s south is often impassable because of fights between gangs for territory. According to UN figures, this violence drove around 15,000 people to flee in June alone.
The Haitian human rights organization RNDDH criticizes the government’s handling of the disaster as “total chaos”. “You are completely left to your own devices,” it says of the earthquake victims. Some are looking for tents to shelter from the storm on their own. Desperate injured people wait in front of understaffed and poorly equipped hospitals.
Interim Prime Minister Ariel Henry announced faster work on Twitter. “We will increase our energies tenfold in order to reach and help the greatest number of victims,” he wrote. Henry also ordered three days of national mourning starting Tuesday.
Haiti’s already severely underfunded health system is overstretched by the recent worsening pandemic. In addition, there is a deep political crisis that intensified after the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse by a commando in his residence on July 7th.
“Grace” gained strength on Tuesday morning (local time) and moved on towards Jamaica. A tropical cyclone is considered a hurricane from 119 kilometers per hour. dpa
