Haiti In Extremis
Held in thrall by history, tradition, endemic poverty; victim of geography, geology and the vicissitudes of violent weather conditions, Haiti has once again met explosive disaster.
After its independence from France in 1804, Haiti was the first country to be governed by people taken as slaves from Africa. It has since then suffered the misfortune of being governed by one misbegotten, autocratic thug after another. Haitians are not without a grim sense of humour, with their observation that God's pact with the Devil created their miserable homeland.
The very name represents Land of High Mountains in one of the native tongues. Unlike its neighbour, the Dominican Republic on the Island of Hispaniola, the geography is not green and lush and beautiful, since 98% of its trees have been lost to deforestation, and the landscape presents as mud-brown. Almost 80% of the population live on roughly two dollars a day. And about 300,000 children were sold into slavery by their parents.
Infant mortality is high, and the Haitian life expectancy is 53 years. The domestic structure hasn't been built to earthquake standards; mostly cement with no steel infrastructure, readily collapsing into ruin when the earth rumbles beneath. The indigent live in fragile, tin-roofed shanty towns. Ferocious storms created havoc in the country, killing thousands and making greater numbers homeless in 2008.
Repression and torture represented a common fact of life in Haiti for generations. And voodoo witchcraft kept people fearful and controlled beyond protest for recognition of their rights to humane living conditions. Now, a 7.0-strength earthquake on the Richter scale - equivalent to a 10-megaton bomb explosion - has pulled the props out from under an already-beleaguered population.
Estimates on the number of dead stand at roughly 50,000, with many more injured, and trapped under collapsed buildings. The Red Cross estimates that three million Haitians could be affected through death, injury and homelessness, out of a total population of 9 million. Catastrophe on that scale is unimaginable for most people, although China, Sumatra, Japan, Turkmenistan, Peru, Italy, Iran and Pakistan are familiar with that kind of scale.
Countries all around the world have responded, sending out disaster relief teams, emergency humanitarian supplies, food and water. Canada has deployed its Disaster Assistance Response Team to aid in search-and-rescue, to deliver food, water, medicine and survival necessities. The U.S. has dispatched aid shipments and emergency relief teams.
Previous disasters, not long past, have wrought mass destruction, including the partial destruction of the country's airport landing strips, so that humanitarian flights into the country face delays, although many have landed in the Dominican Republic and people and provisions find their way overland through inadequate road linkage.
The repercussions of this disaster are felt all over the world, since Haitians desperate for decent living conditions and opportunities for their futures and that of their children, have left the country in droves, to find haven and live elsewhere. And in North America and elsewhere, expatriate Haitians are desperately trying to get in touch with relatives and friends.
Another dreadful and sad story in the annals of the world's natural disasters.
After its independence from France in 1804, Haiti was the first country to be governed by people taken as slaves from Africa. It has since then suffered the misfortune of being governed by one misbegotten, autocratic thug after another. Haitians are not without a grim sense of humour, with their observation that God's pact with the Devil created their miserable homeland.
The very name represents Land of High Mountains in one of the native tongues. Unlike its neighbour, the Dominican Republic on the Island of Hispaniola, the geography is not green and lush and beautiful, since 98% of its trees have been lost to deforestation, and the landscape presents as mud-brown. Almost 80% of the population live on roughly two dollars a day. And about 300,000 children were sold into slavery by their parents.
Infant mortality is high, and the Haitian life expectancy is 53 years. The domestic structure hasn't been built to earthquake standards; mostly cement with no steel infrastructure, readily collapsing into ruin when the earth rumbles beneath. The indigent live in fragile, tin-roofed shanty towns. Ferocious storms created havoc in the country, killing thousands and making greater numbers homeless in 2008.
Repression and torture represented a common fact of life in Haiti for generations. And voodoo witchcraft kept people fearful and controlled beyond protest for recognition of their rights to humane living conditions. Now, a 7.0-strength earthquake on the Richter scale - equivalent to a 10-megaton bomb explosion - has pulled the props out from under an already-beleaguered population.
Estimates on the number of dead stand at roughly 50,000, with many more injured, and trapped under collapsed buildings. The Red Cross estimates that three million Haitians could be affected through death, injury and homelessness, out of a total population of 9 million. Catastrophe on that scale is unimaginable for most people, although China, Sumatra, Japan, Turkmenistan, Peru, Italy, Iran and Pakistan are familiar with that kind of scale.
Countries all around the world have responded, sending out disaster relief teams, emergency humanitarian supplies, food and water. Canada has deployed its Disaster Assistance Response Team to aid in search-and-rescue, to deliver food, water, medicine and survival necessities. The U.S. has dispatched aid shipments and emergency relief teams.
Previous disasters, not long past, have wrought mass destruction, including the partial destruction of the country's airport landing strips, so that humanitarian flights into the country face delays, although many have landed in the Dominican Republic and people and provisions find their way overland through inadequate road linkage.
The repercussions of this disaster are felt all over the world, since Haitians desperate for decent living conditions and opportunities for their futures and that of their children, have left the country in droves, to find haven and live elsewhere. And in North America and elsewhere, expatriate Haitians are desperately trying to get in touch with relatives and friends.
Another dreadful and sad story in the annals of the world's natural disasters.
Labels: Environment, Nature, World News
posted by Pieface | 6:42 PM
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