Desperation in Haiti (2006)

Haiti 2006 before the earthquake

In Haiti 2006, there were poverty, diseases and violated rights plaguing the country. In Haiti 2006, approximately 1 of every 14 babies was dying before they passed their first birthday. Recently, Haiti has elected a new government and president with a little hope of changing the desperate situation in Haiti. The new president Mr.Preval claimed that he would work toward child development and protection plan such as MDG. But he is currently facing problems such as low child mortality, education and vaccination rate and child malnutrition that needs to be solved to his goals. Children’s rights are being violated in lot of them don’t get education and proper health care. Only 41 percent children with simple diarrhea receive proper medical care. 5000 babies are born with HIV each year and only 300 are treated properly. About 45 percent of children can’t get primary education because of poverty and distance from their home to school. Some of them have to live out in the streets fighting for their lives from gang activity. When a family is poor, a child would be made Restaveks (Creole dialect ‘to stay with’), live away from families, often getting exploited and abused. The only way to change this is the constant political leadership and continued attention to the children’s rights, placing children in the middle of the society.

Haiti in 2010

The new president, Mr.Preval's plan to reach the MDG seems to be hopeless right now. In 2010, there were earthquakes that struck Haiti with magnitude of 7.0. The earthquake destroyed most of the Haiti's capital city Port au Prince. The earth quake took away thousands of life, Haitian's little wealth and growing hope of reconstructing Haiti as a healthy, wealthy and child - caring country. Almost three million people were attacked by the earthquake. In just 3 days after the earthquake, a golf course was full of refugees building tents for survival. Red cross Doctors and volunteers from various countries went to Haiti to help them rebuild the country and save deseperate people. Millions of dollars were donated to Haiti for help, altough some of them didn't reach those people in need due to the corruption, making it harder for Haiti to cope with the damage caused by the earthquake. Haiti suffers from health crisis and still needs more aids from other country. On BBC article (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8482237.stm), it said that Haiti needs about another $300 million to fulfil the amount of food and water in need. About 60% of population in Haiti's capital Port au Prince have received proper water aid. They also estimated that about 692000 are currently staying in 590 temporary shelters, which is more than 5 times of its normal capacity. People of Haiti hope that the countries keep helping the country so that they can hopefully save the country from the earthquake damage


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8482237.stm
http://grmfoundation.com/yahoo_site_admin/assets/images/haitian_children.12182548_std.jpg
http://cdn.maf.org/assets/1WZuFS66mYpXfYEd_FkqPw/033531-Haiti-2010Q1A-R.jpg