The first order of business today was to get the promised food and water to the orphans we discovered in Carrefour yesterday. We must find a longer term solution that will keep them from depending on others in the community who are scrounging daily for necessities. One important need that will be faced in upcoming months by Haitians will be how to gain access to food and water that is not logistically wasting resources.
God opened doors for healthcare as well. The medical teams spent the morning examining the remaining children there. All but two had no serious problems, and the team was able to take care of them. We were thrilled that as reported yesterday, another organization was able deliver those 400 diapers and 10 cases of food supplement powder. There is a local Haitian now working with the orphanage’s director as they seek a longer term shelter and disposition solution for the children now that immediate situation is stabilized.
Two of us stayed in PaP and two drove to Cap Haitian to meet the team there. The military has been flying 60-80 patients per day to a hospital there. It has been overwhelmed with patient volume and needs. Our partner opened up the church grounds to receive patients who are pre-discharge. Tents and tarps were set up for them and as they are able, they will move to their next destination. The challenge where to send them? Most of the patients have no idea that PaP incurred such incredible destruction. They want to return home; but because they were unburied from rubble, transported to various places and eventually to Cap for surgery, they really have no concept of the situation there. Going home to PaP is simply not an option. Finding family living outside PaP will be the first solution but getting them to those family members who can help with daily needs as they face physical and emotional rehabilitation will require planning and effort.
Another substantial long-term challenge is fear. We took a PaP native up with us to Cap Hatian. Even though there was no earthquake in Cap Haitian, he simply couldn’t sleep inside the house. He’d go in to eat, seated near a doorway, but he has been so impacted by the destruction in PaP that it is unconceivable that he could sleep inside a concrete structure again. And this is a Haitian policeman, used to difficult situations and certainly not a fearful person by nature. Part of our focus will be training Haitians to be crisis counselors. There will be many emotional and physical problems that follow a crisis of this magnitude and, in training Haitians, the more we are multiplying ourselves.
TeamDuggan 
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