Given the 24/7, rapidly changing news cycle, it’s easy to forget that less than two months ago a 7.2 earthquake hit the southwest peninsula of Haiti, followed two days later by a direct hit from Tropical Depression Grace. Grace exacerbated the earthquake calamity by dumping more than 5 inches of rain causing flooding and landslides. More recent Haitian news headlines have been filled with the political fallout from the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse and the fact that gangs are now controlling much of Port-au-Prince and other major cities across Haiti.
HAM’S Pharmacy Technician, Darlene Marie, Joseph, with her newborn son recently delivered at HAM’s Safe Birthing Center
Unlike the 2010 earthquake that damaged much of Port-au-Prince, killed hundreds of thousands of Haitians, and brought a flood of international volunteers and NGO’s into the country, the August 14th earthquake attracted little international involvement. Fortunately, several official Haitian NGO’s such as Healing Art Missions (HAM), who’ve worked on the ground providing medical services since long before the 2010 earthquake, learned many lessons from the 2010 response. Dr. Jacques, medical director/CEO HAM Haiti, used his experience from the response to the 2010 earthquake, his connections to the PaP medical community, and personal knowledge of the remote location of the 2021 earthquake to quickly assess the situation. He understood the severe surgical and medical supply limitations of the hospitals in the devastated areas and that the quickest response to address complicated fractures and crush injuries would come from Haitian surgical specialists, many of whom reside in the Port-au-Prince area. If you’ve been following HAM’s Newsletters you know that HAM, through Dr. Jacques leadership, assembled and organized specialist surgical teams, and negotiated with the government and public and private hospitals. HAM’s teams were among the first NGO’s to reach Les Cayes, the largest city close to the epicenter.
Direct Relief-provided midwife kits arrive at Maison de Naissance in the days following the earthquake the rattled southwestern Haiti in August. (Courtesy photo)
An important but less visible factor in the success of NGO’s, like HAM, who believe the Haitian medical community should always take the lead in the public health arena, is the web of partnerships that have been established over the years. A perfect example of such a partnership connects HAM to a California based NGO, Direct Relief International (DRI) who supply donated medicines and medical supplies to established NGO’s working on the ground delivering medical services. This partnership began following the 2010 earthquake with DRI supplying HAM’s Dumay Primary Clinic with hundreds of thousands of dollars of medicine and medical supplies and equipment over the years. Just within the past few months we received a significant delivery of birth assistance kits for Midwives to use in support of our Safe Birthing Program.
A few days ago DRI published a news piece on their site titled Haiti Earthquake Disrupts Access to Maternal Health Care, which talks about their partnership with another NGO, Maison de Naissance (MN), which was heavily damaged by the August 14th earthquake. MN a modern, culturally appropriate maternal center, established in 2004 and sponsored by Global Birthing Home Foundation which provides accessible and affordable maternity care in the La Cayes area. The article speaks to the importance of accessible healthcare as well as the realities and challenges of providing such services as birth deliveries in an earthquake affected area. It also demonstrates the importance of partnerships between local NGO’s delivering health care services, and international NGO’s who can provide relatively quick access to medical supply resources. In this particular case, DRI also provided direct financial support to help rebuild severally damaged facilities.
Direct Relief International has also provided HAM’s Safe Birthing Program with midwife kits.
Healing art Missions also responded to the urgent need for maternal care. While Dr. Jacques was assessing the medical needs of the Haitian population most affected by the earthquake, he noticed a severe shortage of midwives at the Hôpital Sainte Thérèse de Miragoâne. The city of Miragoâne is located on the north side of the peninsula, and St. Thérèse is one of the hospitals where Dr. Jacques negotiated for placement of HAM’s surgical teams. After checking the current work schedule of the four midwives working at the Dumay Safe Birthing Program, Dr. Jacques realized he could adjust the schedule so that one of the midwives, Joel, would be able to work for two months at Hôpital Sainte Thérèse de Miragoâne to help ease that burden. Fortunately, in La Cayes, on the south of the peninsula, MN remained operational despite damage to their facility, making sure supervised births were able to continue in that area.
HAM’s Board of Directors in the U.S. are extremely proud of our Haitian staff, under the leadership of Dr. Jacques, as well as all members of the medical teams put together to respond to the earthquake. These dedicated, hardworking Haitian professionals, along with so many others working with NGO’s responding to the many current medical needs in Haiti, have been responsible for mounting an effective response to a natural disaster within their own borders. As we at HAM have said many times before, the best thing international aid groups can do for Haitians is provide the necessary resources to address their own challenges.