On Sunday, the United States government granted disaster status to Haiti’s recent outbreak of cholera, a bacterial disease that has so far infected 3,000 people and claimed 250 victims. Today, the situation in rural Haiti is starting to stabilize, and officials are optimistic that it won’t gain steam in the capital city of Port-au-Prince, where the densely populated tent cities still house earthquake victims.
Hôpital Saint Nicolas in the rural area of St. Marc, which is operated by Partners in Health (PIH) in partnership with the Haitian Ministry of Health, hospitalized 300 patients on Sunday. But every day hospital patient management improves, according to PIH’s Haiti Chief of Mission Dr. Louise Ivers, as does the state of patients seeking to be admitted to the hospital.
“What we do see are slightly less severe cases of the disease when people arrive at the hospital,” Ivers said during a Monday afternoon conference call. “When they arrive, they are still ambulatory and at that stage, more responsive to the oral rehydration.”
The health ministry and non-governmental organizations on the ground have rushed clinical reinforcements and supplies to the region and have mounted a massive community education and mobilization campaign. Community health workers are fanning out throughout the area to distribute oral rehydration salts and soap and to warn people of the need to drink only clean or purified water and wash their hands frequently — the two keys to preventing further spread of the disease. Various groups have been using radio messages played from the backs of “tap taps,” the Haitian bus taxis to spread messages of prevention.
Five patients were diagnosed with cholera in Port-au-Prince over the weekend, but officials said they got sick outside the capital, which means the disease is not yet originating within the city.
The nation’s leading cell phone company DigiCell conducted a study on Saturday to see if people were moving around the country in more frenetic patterns than usual and found that there was no major change to the daily migration.
We’ll keep you updated as reports keep coming in.
Photos by Jo Piazza.
