Supreme Master Ching Hai International Association relief news update from Haiti.
Nearly two months after the January 12 earthquake that shattered Port-au-Prince and surrounding regions, the Haitian government has begun the slow process of comprehensive reconstruction, with international aid donors collaborating to help the population recover.

Meanwhile, an acute need remains for basic emergency supplies, as hundreds of thousands of Haitians remain crammed in tent camps, jobless and dependent on international aid for their basic living needs.

Lacking adequate shelter, many survivors, including the injured, have been drenched in the first heavy rains and unsanitary conditions.

As our Association’s relief team member, who is also a medical doctor, observed:
Our Association relief team member, medical doctor (F): What we are now seeing is people coming with a lot of fevers, like typhoid, typhoid fever, malaria, and infections of different kinds.

I think part of this is because so many people have lost their homes in the earthquake. A lot of people living in the streets or living in crowded tents. A lot don’t have any accommodation at all; they are just living outside.

VOICE: Upon knowing of the people’s dire conditions, Supreme Master Ching Hai on March 3 donated an additional US$40,000 specifically to purchase more tents for the homeless, bringing her total relief contribution to US$134,000.

With further donations from our worldwide Association members, the combined US$468,000 in donated funds could obtain US$16.7 million in needed supplies if purchased in the United States, based on Haiti’s cost of living.

To date, some hundreds of tents have been distributed with thousands more on the way. In addition, relief team members of our Association have continued to arrive, with most covering their own travel expenses.

According to their areas of expertise, the team has been offering surgical and medical care, as well as delivering pain medication, per Supreme Master Ching Hai’s request for the many wounded.

Our Association relief team member, medical doctor (F): I think the Haitian people are amazing. They’re a very dignified people. They’re a very patient people.

And they seem to have an inner joy that has not been extinguished by the recent earthquake, and by the terrible trauma that they have suffered. It’s a great privilege to help them at this time.

VOICE: With many of our Association team members being chefs and cooks in vegan restaurants by profession, the nutritional needs of thousands of Haitians are also being met as the team works together with the Adventiste hospital kitchen staff in Carrefour to prepare safe, immunity-boosting vegan meals for the entire hospital.

Haitian hospital volunteer (M): Food plays a major role for the patients because there are many patients here who couldn’t find, who don’t have money to buy food. But when they find food, it does them good. Workers also. I love it because when we eat vegetable, fruits, it makes us healthy.

Dominican nurse inside hospital (F): Your work is very important because you keep us healthy. We have health and energy in order to work with the people.

VOICE: Thanks to Supreme Master Ching Hai’s support, our Association’s relief team has also been able to serve other clinics as well as another hospital and several outdoor camp sites. One of the kitchen team members shares more details.

Voice of our Association’s relief team member (F): This is our cooking team. There are about 10 of us working during the rush hour.

Every vegetable we use is fresh. We are focusing on vegan food, so we’re adding more protein to help patients get more healthy and heal faster. Everybody puts all their energy, their care, their love into the food that they make.

Every day, we cook 150 pounds of rice and 150 pounds of beans. We have to pick all the rocks from beans and rice and we wash it really carefully with water.

When we started this program a month ago, there were only 500 meals a day. But now the number keeps increasing, around 3,000 meals a day, lunch and dinner. The patients all live in the tent and it's really compact.
The situation is really bad, because the weather, like it just rained yesterday, and all the patients’ clothing was really wet, and they did not have any food at all.

They were just waiting for us to go out and serve them two meals a day, and they really appreciate what we do for them.

VOICE: We thank all the governments, organizations, and volunteers who are supporting the quake-affected in Haiti. Our gratefulness also goes to Supreme Master Ching Hai for her caring aid as well as to our Association’s relief team for their ongoing efforts.

With prayers for the resiliency and steady recovery of the kind Haitian people, may the day come soon when such tragic events subside through our gentler treatment of nature and our co-inhabitants.

http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/news/article.cfm?id=4297&cat=field-news&ref=home-center-relatedlink
http://globalhealth.kff.org/Daily-Reports/2010/March/04/GH-030410-Haiti.aspx