Wednesday, February 17, 2010

HHRD Team in Port Au Prince, Haiti

Weekly Update Narrated by Shahid Hayat [US Executive Director HHRD] in Haiti

Saturday Feb 13, 2010 - Visit to Leogane
Helping Hand for Relief & Development (HHRD) Team visits Leo-Gane (Leogane), which is 30 km from Port Au Prince. Leogane is located very close to the epicenter of the Jan 12th, 2010 earthquake and suffered great damages (up to 90 % of the town has been reported to be damaged). Ministry of Health, Haiti has identified Leogane as one of the priority areas for medical assistance and WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene): Other priority areas are Carrefour, Grand Goave, Petit Goave, and Jacmel.

HHRD Team met with the local Leogane community to establish a shelter village in the area for 100 families. This will benefit about 1,000 people, who are homeless after the earthquake. The Local community and HHRD agreed to build these shelters as soon as possible. We are in process to coordinate with the local Government and UN authorities to facilitate the basic infrastructure like electricity, water and sanitation. Br. Saqib Ateeq (NJ) and Dr. Mubashir Saeed (Chicago, IL) join the HHRD Team in Haiti today.

Sunday Feb 14, 2010 - Vaccinations
HHRD Team arranged Td vaccination at two locations: One at Masjid Toaheed and second one close to the security office of Br. Yousuf, who is a local Muslim community leader. In these two locations, HHRD Team vaccinated more than three hundred women, children, and men. Dr. Mubashir Saeed of Chicago, IL; Dr. Mohammad Panday of Kansas City, MO; and the rest of the HHRD team spent the entire day in these locations, advising local communities about prevention from various diseases as a result of an earthquake. A Team of Doctors from Bangladesh visits HHRD camp and appreciates these services. They promise to join our mobile health clinic in different areas from the next day (Monday).

Monday Feb 15, 2010 - Mobil Clinic in Masjid Allah-u-Akbar
Today is our regular day for the mobile health clinic and it is scheduled at Masjid Allah-u-Akbar. This Masjid is still standing, despite being surrounded by flattened buildings. Allah SWT saved this Masjid making this view is quite touching.

We leave our base camp in two vehicles with medicines and volunteers. Today is another hectic day. We are well-staffed with six doctors and two paramedical staff to serve about 200 women, children, and men. Three doctors and one paramedical are from Bangladesh, including Dr. Mamoon, Dr. Chowdhary, Dr. Shahid Ul Islam and Raza Ul Karim (Paramedical Staff). Also we have Dr. Mohammad Panday (Kansas, MO), Dr. Mubashir Saeed (Chicago, IL) and Dr. Daniel (Port Au Prince, Haiti), plus we have one more Paramedical Staff from Port Au Prince.

HHRD team serves more than 200 patients from morning till evening. Our medical camp is much appreciated by the community. Even before our arrival, with the knowledge of our team coming, the local community made basic arrangements and are were very supportive in further helping us to arrange and set up the clinics, bringing the chairs-&-tables and covering the whole area with sheets to protect us and the medication we brought from the sun s heat.

Earlier, Br. Saqib (NJ) left us to coordinate with UNO about medications, and up until now, with the Grace of Allah SWT, the HHRD Team has been purchasing all the medications (mostly from USA and some from Dominican Republic), sending them through US volunteer doctors going to Haiti. HHRD Team has been utilizing hundreds of dollars worth of these medicines every day. Br. Saqib has meetings with various officials to find out how we can coordinate with different agencies, who are working in the area. He discovers that we can get some medicines at a low cost; but that needs permission from Haiti Government officials. Also he is able to coordinate with UNICEF for some other medicines: However that needs more paper work before we can start to receive those medicines from UNICEF.

Tuesday Feb 16, 2010 - Health Clinic in Nazon
Today we are leaving our base camp at 9am as we are scheduled to set-up our mobile health clinic in the Nazon, which is another affected area (70% of the houses are destroyed, making people homeless and living on the streets). Today we have four doctors, two paramedical staff, and six community volunteers.

The Community is very happy to see us as we arrived after our last visit there some seven days ago. We serve their health needs with proper medicines. Dr. Mamoon and Dr. Shahid Ul Islam from Bangladesh; Dr. Mohammad Panday from Kansas, MO; Dr. Mubashir Saeed from Chicago, IL and Dr. Daniel from Port Au Prince, Haiti are serving, along with Raza Ul Karim (Bangladeshi Paramedical Staff and one Haitian Paramedical Staff.

The local community is very supportive, even at times it is hard to set up clinics on the streets due to difficulty in controlling the crowd. But Alhamdulillah local brothers help us to control the crowd and set up the clinics. They remain with us until we are done and ready to get back to our base camp. Today we have served more than 150 people in this area and gave them about $1,000 worth of medicines.

On the other hand, Br. Saqib (NJ) visits Haiti Government Office to get the permission for the medicines and Alhamdulillah he is able to get the permission after waiting for more than two hours. We will get medicines for low price after this permission InshaAllah.

We had earlier plans to visit Leo-Gane (Leogane), where we have to set up our shelter village and meet with local community: However it is too late now and our local representative advises us that we should not go there late evening because of rough roads and other security issues. InshaAllah we will try to close our clinic early and then visit Leogane tomorrow, so as to discuss with the local community the mechanism and plans for establishing the shelter village.

Please visit the www.muslimsforhaiti.org to listen to the update interview from Shahid Hayat and Br. Yousuf, Local Haitian Volunteer helping in the Medical Clinic.

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