Sunday, October 24, 2010
Cholera cases have been reported in Haiti's capitol.
Even in the best of times Haiti is one step away from an epidemic, now with so many people still living in squalid refugee camps and medicine and doctors in such short supply, Haiti may have reached the tipping point.
More than a million survivors of Haiti's devastating January earthquake are crowded into tent cities around Port-au-Prince with poor sanitary conditions and little access to clean drinking water.One way to help the people of Haiti before they get clobbered again is through Doctors Without Borders or the Red Cross.
Aid officials have described the prospect of cholera in the city as "awful".
Those in the camps are highly vulnerable to the intestinal infection, which is caused by bacteria transmitted through contaminated water or food.
Cholera causes diarrhoea and vomiting leading to severe dehydration, and can kill quickly if left untreated through rehydration and antibiotics.
With 2,674 cases of the disease reported, health officials have been trying to contain the outbreak in Artibonite and Central Plateau.
They said they had stepped up disease prevention measures and surveillance at the tent camps, and sent medical teams north to treat those infected so they did not travel to the capital to seek help.
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