UN mulls quick foreign troop deployment as health crisis exacebates
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called Sunday for the immediate deployment of a specialized international armed force in Haiti, a country paralyzed by security crisis under the grip of criminal gangs and looming cholera.
There have been 11 confirmed and 111 suspected cases of the water-borne cholera bacteria since it was recently detected,
According to Nadège Sainvilus, a doctor; “At the beginning of this week, we received several cases of cholera infection, more than twenty. Unfortunately, last Wednesday there were two deaths from cholera among these patients. But so far we don’t have any deaths. I think we have about a hundred hospitalisations in this centre and we have recorded more than twenty discharges today.”
The UN believes the numbers could be much higher as tests are underway to determine whether or not it is the same strain as in 2010 when over 10,000 people killed.
The deteriorating security situation exacerbates the difficult health condition.
Haiti has been mired for years in a deep economic, security and political crisis, and the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse in 2021 has profoundly worsened the situation, with the gangs taking an ever stronger hold.
