Haiti pre-quake medical stats

Haiti is in agony; the earthquake has destroyed its buildings, homes, lives. But with regard to health care, there wasn't much to destroy in the first place. Even before the quake hit the capital, leaving its hospitals "abandoned or destroyed" the country's medical infrastructure was in shambles. Three fourths of the population had no access to any kind of health care as of 2008, according to the International Crisis Group. There are no emergency wards to speak of in the country, and only one doctor for every 3,000 citizens, compared with seven docs per 3,000 people in the U.S. Private hospitals charge fees that put decent medical care out of reach for everyone but the Haitian elite, and public clinics, according to an April report from Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières, or MSF), "are often plagued by management problems, strikes, and shortages of staff, drug, and medical supplies." It's no surprise, then, that despite Haiti's recent strides toward a more stable society, the country had what MSF's operation director called in April an "immediate public health crisis" long before the quake. Life expectancy is 61 years (Americans, on average, live to 78), and out of every 100,000 pregnant women, 630 die young of complications, a rate 50 times greater than it is in the U.S. Haiti's infant mortality is the worst in the western hemisphere, at 60 deaths per 1,000 births, compared with U.S. rates of 7 per 1,000. A third of babies are born underweight. Malnourishment, according to MSF, is "endemic." Almost 4 percent of people have HIV, compared to 0.3 percent of the U.S. population. In the slums, there's open sewage; everywhere, there's undrinkable water and the malaria-bearing mosquitoes that breed in it. NewsWeek

It sounds like Haiti's plan for disaster recovery was to depend on the kindness of every other country in the world. Not a good plan. What will the death toll be? I shutter thinking of the stacks of bodies that were on the streets in some of the internet videos. The looks on people's faces were as devastated as their surroundings. Someone was noted for asking [from memory] "Where are we going to bury all these poor people."

The remainder of the story quoted above is about the global recession and general apathy that people will have because, let's face it, people have their own problems to deal with. It is day three and people are complaining that the news cycle is moving forward.

Welcome to the 24 hour world. Actually, you are lucky to keep someone's attention for three consecutive uninterrupted minutes these days. Everything is here today and gone tomorrow. So many people, organizations, companies, products, events, and family are all clambering for every moment of our existence that the competition is killing us. Politicians complain that they have to compete with celebrities for the attentions of the Paparazzi. Parents who want celebrity status make outrageous claims that their kids are in a run away balloon to make the evening news.

How can a natural disaster hope to contend?