Jacqueline Koch is working with Merlin in Haiti. In her third field diary, Jacqueline writes about the threat of the coming rainy season.
My home in Haiti is a tent, next to the house and office. One night last week, I woke to the patter of raindrops falling on the roof. The pace quickened, and suddenly, a light shower turned into a heavy squall. Though the rain brings fresh air, but for 1.2 million displaced people, it brings renewed misery in earthquake-shattered Haiti.
Haiti's climate is a study in extremes: mind-numbing heat and heavy rain downpours evolving into deadly hurricanes later in the season.
Working out of field hospital tents, pitched under a boiling sun with no shade in sight, temperatures soar to over 106 degrees F - the maximum reading on the thermometer. Computer laptop keyboard and touch-pads short out. Phones overheat and have to be turned off. The refrigerator storing drugs almost seems to have lost its will to live. But our hospital staff and patients are luckier than the thousands of people in displacement camps. We have fans.
Though it might temper the heat, when Haiti's infamous rainy season starts, it will dovetail cruelly with this ongoing and complex humanitarian emergency. Mixed with exacerbating problems such as inadequate shelter, food, clean water or sanitation, rain can lead to increased disease risks. Health agencies are bracing against potential disease outbreaks. It's a common cycle often seen when large displaced populations are residing in camps, but the solutions don’t come easily.
A peak over the fence into the camp next to the hospital, where an estimated 2,000 people live, I glimpse what the rains will have in store for them. Caked in mud and with machetes in hand, scores of people dig meager trenches to channel the water away from their tents. Everything is soaked. There is little respite from the elements. Bathing and washing clothes from this short spell of inclement weather won't be easy. Water supplies are critically low and the government and aid agencies are trying to cope with the demand.
Water shortages aren't limited to camps. Our house and office supply had run out before the next scheduled water truck delivery. The 18 residents of this compound were suddenly without functioning showers or toilets or water to wash our dishes and clothes.
It was unhappy news, given the heat had returned and there was a lot of grumbling around the house. I thought back on what I saw in the camp over the fence, grateful to have a reality check.
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