Thursday, November 11, 2010

Cholera = Mystery

I have been keeping updates on the outbreak via friends that are still at the mission we stayed at while in Haiti. As of their last count they have seen over 400 people, have had 9 deaths, and more people dying on the way to the clinics. They are unfortunately having to learn how to 'dispose' of these bodies. Please keep this country in your prayers! If you are interested in reading more about this, let me know and I can send you some of my blogs that I follow.

Sudden Death by Cholera a Mystery to Haitians

Claudette Brianvil's husband, Jean-Anel Pierre, says his wife loved to cook. And go to church. These are such ordinary details that it becomes easy to forget how extraordinary her death was. And not just because she was the mother of four young children.

Claudette died of cholera, a disease that had been so rare in Haiti that even as its numbers escalate, ordinary people here still don't understand it. Her neighbors in Cite Soleil all know she died of cholera. But there are a lot of theories on how and why she got the disease. Some say it's evil; others say it is a plot by the government. It's moving so fast, they say, it's as if the cholera wants people to die.

The government of Haiti has so far confirmed more than 600 cholera-related deaths across the country in the past few weeks, and one death -- Claudette's -- in Port-au-Prince. The numbers, released by Haiti's Ministry of Public Health, are at least three days old, and new numbers, to be released Friday, will likely double.


More of the article here.

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