News from the Field

Japanese civilian and military medical personal are continuing to work around the clock at the epicenter of Haiti’s earthquake to help survivors of the worst natural disaster to hit the Caribbean country in two centuries.

A 25-strong team from the Japan Disaster Relief (JDR) system arrived shortly after the tremor struck earlier this month killing well over 100,000 people according to government figures and began work in the rubble of the town of Leogane, several miles from the capital of Port au Prince, and which was at the very heart of the tremor.

The United Nations said that between 80-90 % of the town, which had a population of 134,000 before the disaster, was in ruins.

The JDR has now been joined by the first of some 104 medical personnel from the Japanese Self Defense Forces including surgeons.

Because of the very scale of the disaster, many survivors were not able to immediately receive any of the aid or assistance arriving daily from around the world, even in the capital and particularly in outlying areas such as Leogane.

The Japanese team was among the first group of helpers to arrive in the town and was virtually overwhelmed by the scale of the disaster.

As soon as they established their medical center, the doctors, nurses and other staffs were inundated with townspeople seeking help for multiple types of injuries and team members have been working literally 24 hours a day since then and have treated several hundred victims with various problems.

Other medical assistance has since arrived with several non governmental organizations joining the JDR team members and officials from the British and Japanese Red Cross and the International Red Cross have also visited the site.

JDR doctor, Dr. Yamamoto, who had previously lived in Haiti, paid a courtesy call on the Haitian Foreign Minister to report on the activities of the team and receive Haiti’s thanks.

The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), who is the key operator of the JDR system under the management of the Japanese Government, also sent emergency supplies including tents, blankets, plastic sheeting, sleeping bags and water purifiers to Port au Prince from its main regional warehouse in Miami. As the JDR team began leaving Haiti it handed over both responsibility for remaining causalities and some of the equipment it had been using to Japanese Self Defense Force and other civilian medical staff.