It's been a year. A whole year since the most devastating disaster imaginable to us as human beings has hit the first independent black nation, Haiti. What's even more devastating is the condition of the country since the disastrous earthquake one year ago. A receding condition has plagued the country which still inhabits thousands of hatians that are not living in homes but camps.
If you remember, when the earthquake hit last year, the impact, or aftershocks, were not as strong as those that hit other nations. However, the impact was far worse than other nations, because of the infrastructure of buildings in Haiti. They crumbled on top of adults children and animals. It made us wonder, if Haiti is a country in the western hemisphere how could it have endured for hundreds of years with out buildings being rebuilt to withstand natural disasters such as the one that happened a year ago?
You must admit, the attack raised eyebrows. It put a focus on organizations such as yelehaiti which have been begging for assistance from a public which had no idea how bad the conditions were in Haiti.
For those of you who don't remember let me provide some background information:
12, Jan 2010- an earthquake happened in Haiti crushing schools, homes, businesses and allowing the world's most ruthless thugs to escape from prisons in Port au Prince. Aftershocks occured the days following the earthquake and people took to the streets. Many of these people were praying, thanking God for sparing their lives, and others were searching for their relatives. A lot of those who searched for their relatives live in the United States and put up pictures using news organizations like CNN as tools to find their relatives. Many of these people were successful, some were not. Relief like food and medication were not able to reach the people of Haiti, because of the deteriorated infrastructure of the city making it impossible to navigate the streets. The wounded needed surgery and though there were many medical forces on the ground their time was limited. Many of us remember the news clip of Sanjay Gupta operating on three people at one time by himself, because doctors from other nations decided to leave in fear of their safety.
Some wanted to adopt children who were orphans in Haiti and were publicly arrested for kidnapping. It is rumored that some of the children were not orphans (we can deduce why their parents would want them to be adopted...It's obvious and in some cases understandable).
American missionaries arrested for Kidnapping in Haiti. Courtesy: Reuters.
Public figures like Wyclef Jean tried to run for office amidst the criticisms of many individuals. His good intentions were not equal to the stressful situation in his home country and he later had to be hospitalized for exhaustion. As if this wasn't enough, many Hatians suffered from Cholera, an obvious consequence for living conditions such as camps which allowed for open sewage unhygienic surroundings, and diseases which were allowed to travel openly throughout the population. As other diseases began to plague the nation, there was still a shortage of nurses to treat them causing further deterioration of the health of patients and communities. All the while, crime remained at an all time high. Theft mostly. People started rumors of another earthquake occuring and when people ran for their lives thinking it was true, their belongings were stolen. Police complained about the inability to catch theives, because of the set up of the relief camps, which is still happening today.
Now that you're all caught up you can see that, unfortunately, not much has changed in a year. In fact it has gotten a lot worse. According to The Guardian, most of the displaced Hatian population still live in the camps and only 5% of the rubble has been cleared from the streets. There has not been a lot of news coverage about Haiti and this has caused individuals to forget about the condition of people there. Hopefully, the count of things that have happened within the last year will show what happens when people forget about their fellow human beings due to lack of media coverage. Government is one thing, grass roots is another. Please, lets make this year different and lets remember the people who are helpless at the moment and who have been for a whole year. Yele Haiti is a great organization that provides help. Many of you know that Wyclef Jean is the Founder and CEO and has been trying to help his people even before this disaster happened. All proceeds are donated at yelehaiti.org. If you would rather donate clothes or other belongings instead of monetary goods you can go to redcross.org. If you would rather donate your time. you can go to reliefweb.int. Either way please give, because remember when you open your hand to give, you open it to receive. Peace
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