Haiti lacks the medical facilities but people are fighting to cope

Itson Darius, 4, lays in an outdoor hospital bed at the Hospital Universitaire De La Pax, nine days after having his left leg amputated above the knee. ActionAid interviewed Itson's mother Maryse Lindor and the video can be seen in this article. ©Charles Eckert/ActionAid ActionAid Anjali Kwatra went to two hospitals with the ActionAid team who are looking at how we can provide long term help to people who have been left disabled by the earthquake.

She wrote of the conditions inside the hospitals and of meeting four year old Itson and his mother Maryse...

Patients are treated at the Hospital Universitaire De La Paix three weeks after a 7.0 earthquake struck on January 12, 2010. ©Charles Eckert/ActionAid The first hospital was big, clean and organised. But outside living in the garden were hundreds of patients who had been discharged but have nowhere else to live.

Itson's Story

We spoke to the family of four year old Itson Darius whose leg was amputated below the knee after it was injured by falling rubble and later became infected. He had lain under the rubble for four days before someone heard his cry and his family managed to dig him out (in video below).

His mother’s joy at finding her son alive is now tempered by the fact that she knows what a difficult life he has ahead of him. Haiti does not have the medical facilities to help people who have lost their limbs. Itson and his family will need long term help and care so that he can lead a normal life.

ActionAid will be focussing on the most vulnerable in its emergency response and that includes helping those who are disabled.

The second hospital was literally on the pavement under a tarpaulin, but the doctors there were managing to treat hundreds of patients each day.

The last job of the day was a meeting with a partner organisation. Their office was destroyed by the quake, so we sat in the road for our discussion. A few metres away a congregation sang hymns. Their church was in ruins, but the Sunday service was not cancelled.

Life goes on - it’s just that a lot of life in Haiti at the moment goes on outside.