"I looked down on the elderly woman who had been laid tidily in the corner of a hotel car park and, somehow, knew that what I was doing would be futile. She was in a serious condition and in obvious pain. Her problem? Intestinal paralysis caused by a broken pelvis and shoulder; the result of being trapped under tons of rubble following the Haiti earthquake. Her treatment was simple – all she needed was nursing care, to a reasonable standard in a moderately equipped hospital. No life-saving surgery, just time and patience would cure all. Yet in Port-au-Prince so many of the hospitals have been reduced to ineffective skeletons of their former selves. Cracked wards, destroyed operating theaters, and hospital staff missing, dead or struggling to come to terms with their own loss." Richard Villar, Merlin Surgical Team Leader.