PRAY FOR HAITI | And the Women Gather

Posted by Lorna Owens in General on 01 29th, 2010 | no responses

By Rebecca Harshbarger
WeNews correspondent
Monday, January 25, 2010

The Haiti earthquake has increased the risks for an estimated 63,000 pregnant women in Port-au-Prince, as medical facilities and supplies have been destroyed. The UNFPA is distributing delivery and ‘dignity’ kits to help minimize the damage.

UNITED NATIONS, New York (WOMENSENEWS)–Rose Mirlande Veilard could no longer feel her baby’s kicks and became scared. The Port-au-Prince, Haiti, resident wondered if her baby had been killed during her struggle to leave her home near Champs de Mars, the presidential plaza, during the earthquake.

Since the earthquake hit Haiti on Jan. 12, the 22-year-old has slept in a car parked outside of a church. When Veilard was finally able to see a doctor at a hospital, she found out her baby was still alive, the U.N. Population Fund, or UNFPA, told Women’s eNews.

But other women in Haiti will not be so lucky.

When the earthquake hit, Haiti’s Ministry of Women was in a meeting with 20 development partners who work with the UNFPA. Almost everyone in the meeting was killed or injured.

“It’s very tragic,” said Dr. Jemilah Mahmood, chief of UNFPA’s humanitarian response team. “You lose the people who could respond and support these communities.”

Of the 3 million people affected by the 7.0-magnitude earthquake that hit Haiti, and the aftershocks that continued as recently as Jan. 20, an estimated 63,000 are pregnant women. In the month ahead, 7,000 women are expected to deliver. Giving birth or seeking prenatal care in a city where even the presidential plaza is destroyed poses countless risks to women in Port-au-Prince and throughout the quake region. The New-York based UNFPA has spearheaded efforts to help minimize the risks these women face.

Logistics a Challenge
“The challenge for Haiti is logistics,” Mahmood said. “We do not want pregnant women, or women and girls overall, to fall off the radar screen.”

Even before the earthquake, giving birth in Haiti was no easy feat. The country has the highest maternal mortality rate in the Northern Hemisphere. For every 100,000 births, 670 mothers do not survive. Fifteen percent of all births before the earthquake had complications that required hospital care, such as hemorrhaging and high blood pressure in the mother, according to the UNFPA.

The UNFPA, a U.N. agency that uses population data to improve reproductive health and make motherhood safer, had 42 staff members in Haiti before the earthquake. They also worked with Haitian midwives to help women deliver safely. Some of their staff were injured and traumatized in the earthquake, though it’s unknown how many members, so the organization is currently assessing how many more people to send to Haiti.

To help combat the earthquake’s impact on expectant mothers, the agency is currently distributing delivery kits to any visibly pregnant women. It includes a clean cloth, a sterile blade, a plastic sheet and other tools in case a mother can’t reach a clinic or hospital in time.

They are also giving ‘dignity kits’ to all women and girls, which include sanitary napkins, moist towelettes and fresh pairs of underwear.

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One of the poorest and least developed countries in the world, Haiti in recent years has struggled with problems ranging from near-constant political upheaval, health crises, severe environmental degradation and an annual barrage of hurricanes, which killed an estimated 800 people and caused vast damage in 2008.

On Jan. 12, 2010, a massive earthquake struck Haiti, devastating its capital. Thousands of people were feared dead. The recent earthquake, the worst in the region in more than 200 years, brought even more suffering to a nation that was already the hemisphere’s poorest and most disaster-prone.

Haiti occupies an area roughly the size of Maryland on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, which it shares with the Dominican Republic. Nearly all of the 8.7 million residents are of African descent and speak Creole and French. The capital is Port-au-Prince.

The country is, by a significant margin, the poorest in the Western Hemisphere, with four out of five people living in poverty and more than half in abject poverty. Deforestation and over-farming have left much of Haiti eroded and barren, undermining subsistence farming efforts, driving up food prices and leaving the country even more vulnerable to natural disasters. Its long history of political instability and corruption has added to the turmoil.One of the poorest and least developed countries in the world, Haiti in recent years has struggled with problems ranging from near-constant political upheaval, health crises, severe environmental degradation and an annual barrage of hurricanes, which killed an estimated 800 people and caused vast damage in 2008.

During the 18th century the western portion of Hispaniola, called Saint-Domingue, was one of the richest colonies in the French empire, known for its lucrative sugarcane and coffee plantations. (The rest of the island was controlled by Spain.) In 1791 the African slave population revolted, eventually winning independence from Napoleon Bonaparte’s France and becoming the second country in the Americas to free itself from colonial rule and the world’s first black republic. The country was renamed Haiti.

Haiti’s history has been marked by many periods of profound political disarray, including frequent changes of governments, military coups and, beginning in 1915, a two-decade occupation by the United States. The most infamous of Haiti’s leaders was François Duvalier, known as Papa Doc, who was elected president in 1957, beginning a long rule known for corruption and human rights abuses that left Haiti increasingly isolated. His son Jean-Claude Duvalier controlled the country from 1971 until he fled in 1986, leading to another period of alternating civilian and military rule.

Despite bouts of optimism in recent years brought on by the implementation of a new constitution and the first peaceful transfer of power between two elected presidents in the nation’s history, Haiti’s politics remain as tumultuous as ever.

In 1991, Jean-Bertrand Aristide took power after winning 67 percent of the vote in a presidential election, but was overthrown shortly after taking office in a violent coup leading to a three year period of military rule that ended only after the intervention of a United Nations force led by the United States. While the 1995 election of Rene Preval, a prominent political ally of Mr. Aristide, was widely praised, subsequent elections were plagued with allegations of fraud, including the 2000 restoration of Mr. Aristide to his old post.

Over the following years violence spread throughout the country as the government cracked down on opposition party leaders, holding power in part with the aid of extra-legal gangs. In February 2004, after groups opposed to the Aristide government seized control of cities and towns throughout Haiti and closed in on the capital, Mr. Aristide resigned and fled to South Africa. U.S.-led armed forces under the authority of the United Nations Security Council were sent to Port-au-Prince to stabilize the situation and to oversee the installation of an interim government. The United Nations has spent some $5 billion on peacekeeping operations since 2004.

In 2006, Mr. Preval was again elected president amidst allegations of impropriety.

Since 2008, the situation has worsened dramatically, with the nation staggering beneath the double whammy of food riots, government instability and a series of hurricanes that killed hundreds and battered the economy.

Hurricanes Gustav, Hanna and Ike and Tropical Storm Fay landed within the space of a month in August and September. Nationally, damages came to a total of $900 million, or nearly 15 percent of the gross domestic product. The national toll was 800 dead, down from 2004 when 3,000 perished.

Haiti needs jobs, a particular challenge in the current economic climate. Haitians often seek work in the United States, but that safety valve has been squeezed given the recession. With some 900,000 youths expected to come into the job market in the next five years, dismal prospects are the main threat to stability.

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