call yourself a humanitarian volunteer?

Our short term volunteers left today after 5 weeks here (they arrived a few days before I did).  Their treat was street-food at ‘Denny’s’.  I think I mentioned he only serves one thing; chicken.  Its pretty good, but not amazing.  Anyway we went there and I had chicken for the third time in a week, and it was only Tuesday.  After dinner we went to a swanky club (by Haitian standards) for a cocktail.  The bouncer was looking quite mean though; black body vest on, boots, shin-pads, he was ready for any sort of  dust up.  But no he was carrying a pistol grip pump action shotgun (you read that right) so I don’t think there was gonna be any trouble.

Covid-19 in Haiti has been very different to the UK.  Much lower levels of infection are seen in the hospitals and many fewer restrictions and/or precautions are obvious in daily life.  In fact the only precautions I see are some shops enforcing masks and the odd individual I see in traffic.  Why?  It is hard to give a reason, in fact there are so many factors there probably isn’t a reason.  The average age in Haiti is 23, so a much younger demographic might be more resilient, despite the poverty and lack of “healthcare”.   That younger population also has fewer co-morbidities – their simpler diet doesn’t have half the amount of processed foods and additives as in the west (though bottled drinks do seem to contain ridiculous amounts of sugar).  Life is lived mostly outdoors, both employment and leisure, even though it is dark early and there is almost no power, people gather outside around the odd bit of light.  And then healthcare is really only available to those that can afford it, so hospital data is virtually meaningless.  Finally I think there is the weather, did I say it was hot and sunny year round?

So with lower levels of infection here at HCBH (one case in more than 5 weeks) the decision was taken to close the Covid-19 ward (the rehab gymnasium was repurposed) and create a ‘side-room’ able to accommodate a single patient.  Part of this involved building a door into the open entrance to what was actually a sluice room. 

Luckily we were able to relocate one such temporary door from the aforementioned gymnasium; it just needed a few tweaks. 

Luckily one of the short term visitors was a carpenter. 

Unfortunately when his big moment came he decided that it was more important to go and buy souvenirs before leaving.  More like a holiday-maker than a humanitarian.