Haiti calls cholera outbreak a matter of national security

Port-au-Prince, Agency
The cholera outbreak that has claimed 583 lives in this impoverished Caribbean nation threatens the country's security, Haitian health authorities said Tuesday.

"The epidemic has already passed being more than a simple urgent humanitarian matter and is a national security problem," Health Ministry Director-General Gabriel Timothee told a press conference in Port-au-Prince.

He said 9,123 people have been hospitalized due to the disease, the first cases of which were reported on Oct. 19.

"It will take a lot of time to be able to control this epidemic," Dr. Timothee said, expressing concern over the spread of cholera to regions that had not been affected initially.

That is the case in the southern part of the country, where four people have been identified who are suspected of contracting the disease but who - the doctor said - have been "stabilized."

Timothee also said that between Oct. 22 and Nov. 7 in the capital slum of Cite Soleil 115 cases were reported, and one of those people died.

Since the outbreak started, officials' greatest fear has been that the illness would spread to the camps in and around Port-au-Prince holding thousands of people displaced by the Jan. 12 earthquake, which left more than 250,000 dead.

In addition, cases have been detected in places that had been free of the disease in the northern province of Artibonite, where the outbreak began.

However, in the first cholera foci detected in Artibonite and in the eastern part of the country there have been no additional deaths in recent days, Timothee emphasized.

Public health authorities reported that they are setting up Cholera Treatment Centers and equipping public and private hospitals to fight the epidemic.

In places such as Saint-Marc, Artibonite, the members of the public who are "afraid" of infection have rejected the establishment of a CTC.

"It's a big problem," said Health Ministry official Joscelyne Pierre-Louis, who called for "avoiding discrimination."