Cholera Hits Haiti

Mission to Haiti – October 31, 2010

We are finally ready for our first guests, Dr. Bill and Ruth Cooper from Fort Collins, Colorado.  Dr. Bill is an old friend whom we have known for a number of years.  The whole idea of a new seminary was his and he was its guiding spirit, architect and chief fundraiser.   During the year that we spent at the OMS Vaudreuil compound, Dr. Bill stayed with us in our house every other month, and we often would spend time after a meal listening to him as he shared with us one of his stories about his days in Detroit where his Dad worked for one of the automobile companies, having literally walked out of the backwoods of West Virginia.  It was a sermon by Dr. Bill one Wednesday evening that convinced us that rather than come in once or twice a year as part of a week long work team that we should take the same leap of faith that Joshua did at the Jordan River and volunteer for a longer term as a missionary.

This past week has been largely about the outbreak of cholera that has taken the lives of several hundred Haitians, and we are told that in the majority of cases it is the children that have suffered the most.  The students here at the seminary have been asked to spread the word this weekend and subsequent weekends when they return to their home churches regarding the importance of boiling water before drinking.  The town of Limbe that is about thirty minutes from us has reported a half a dozen cases of cholera.  What we don’t know is whether these are home grown cases or whether those coming down with it have picked up the parasite elsewhere and contracted cholera once they returned home.  We also heard that a rumor has been spreading among the Haitians that this is all a plot on the part of the Dominican Republic to destabilize Haiti even more than it is. 

Our water here on the seminary compound comes from a deep drilled well, and we should not have any problems.  However, having said this it was in late September of 2008 just after we returned to Haiti from Canada, having gone home for John’s mother’s 97^th birthday, that Dorothy experienced the same symptoms of cholera that they are now reporting, vomiting and an inability to control one’s bowels.  Fortunately our resident medical missionary, was close at hand and immediately put Dorothy on an intravenous drip that is the same treatment that is used for cholera.  No one mentioned the possibility that what Dorothy had was cholera, but in retrospect it sure sounds like what they are currently describing as cholera.  As they say, if it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it probably is a duck.

We visited with Pastor Job of New Life Evangelical Church and School at Grison Garde and he told us the well that our work team helped fund in early May of this year is now a reality, and, in fact, Pastor Job was able to get not only the well drilled for the school but was able to get a well drilled for the community as well.  With this outbreak of cholera it was a great thing the team was able to do because otherwise the people surrounding New Life Church and School would be walking down to the river for their water, the same river where clothes are washed, baths are taken, and livestock are watered.  However, with the wells now a reality the possibility of cholera or other waterborne infections is now greatly reduced.  Pastor Job sends his thanks to the work team for their help.

Dorothy’s birthday and our anniversary have come and gone.  We were going to go to the beach at Cormier to celebrate but because of the cholera situation we decided not to go and instead ended up working.   The one memorable event that occurred on Dorothy’s birthday was that John fell off a ladder (well, really it was one foot on an unstable dresser and one foot on the ladder – give your head a shake!!) while installing curtains or according to John, he was pushed.  The jury is still out as to whether it was just an accident.  John, having survived the “accident” was able to celebrate their anniversary, so they went to Lakay, a restaurant in Cap Haitien for an anniversary lunch of a hamburger and pom frites (French fries).    Despite John’s injuries they both had another anniversary to remember.

Happy Anniversary to St Andrew’s 

The peace of Christ to you

John and Dorothy