The UN imported cholera into Haiti during the earthquake response, which caused the deaths of 7,050 people. What should be done?

If it was unintentional, then the UN should simply look at their procedures and tighten them up. For example, immunizing all peacekeepers.

The UN as a cover organisation for the Illuminati who wish to reduce the world population by all means possible including the spread of disease.

@Qingu I am not so sure the UN “let” it happen as these outbreaks can be part of the unfortunate circumstances civilizations have to contend with following large scale natural disasters like the earthquake that happened which essentially set the table for all sorts of potentials to develop such as this cholera outbreak.

The CDC illustrated it specifically to this outbreak here
“For a cholera outbreak to occur, two conditions have to be met: (1) there must be significant breaches in the water, sanitation, and hygiene infrastructure used by groups of people, permitting large-scale exposure to food or water contaminated with Vibrio cholerae organisms; and (2) cholera must be present in the population. While it is unclear how cholera was re-introduced to Haiti, both of these conditions now exist.”

Under normal conditions cholera is rarely fatal but the devastation of the earthquake caused a large population to be displaced and dependent on outside care and support which could barely provide essentials let alone sufficient medical care for that many people at one time.

Your link is one persons “opinion piece” on the human suffering element and overall IMO the UN did the best they could within the time frame and conditions at hand. People ignore the serious potential that exists if and when these natural disasters occur and seem to expect that some government or international agency will be there to save their butts the very second disaster strikes. Just ain’t possible and why I heed our own governments impassioned urging to be prepared for the “what if”.

What should be done?

We learn from mistakes and move on. Next time do a better job of screening who comes to help. And have cleaner water supplies.

Otherwise, nothing. Because if there is some attempt to impute guilt on the part of the UN (that was indeed trying to do something good in Haiti), then the next time there is an incident where their are great humanitarian needs and the UN could help, it won’t because it would have been burnt (unjustifiably, in my opinion) as a result of their actions in Haiti.

Righteous indignation is fine and dandy, but deeds have consequences, and dumping on the UN for this is going to make them less willing and able to help in the future. Is that a desirable outcome? I doubt it.

@Cruiser

1. It’s true that poor sanitary conditions are necessary for cholera to spread. But someone also had to import cholera into the country. If the UN—specifically the Nepalese contingent—never came to Haiti, Haiti would not have cholera.

2. It’s not an opinion piece.

I think the UN probably did do the best they could, for the most part, but I’m appalled at their response to the cholera outbreak. And in retrospect they should have done more to prevent infectious diseases from entering Haiti through their forces.

@Qingu It is very much an opinion piece and it started out so in the 7th paragraph of a 9 page article…

“but the mission was muddled by the United Nations’ apparent role in igniting the epidemic and its unwillingness to acknowledge it.”

There was nothing apparent about when and where the source of the cholera came from. Both the CDC and the UN put forth a lot of time and effort to determine where this came from.

But the bottom line is was the sheer numbers of displaced people in camps and even the thousands of volunteers that had to be house in make shift camps. Bottom line there is nothing to be gained by pointing fingers at something that would be virtually impossible to prevent.

How does that quote signal the article is an opinion piece? It’s corroborated by the rest of the article’s reporting.

And I disagree that this was impossible to prevent. I’m not sure if you actually read the article. Only a single contingent of UN peacekeepers had cholera, the Nepalese. If they had been properly tested, there would not be cholera in Haiti, those 7000+ people would still be a live, and half a million people there would not be sick from cholera.

And I disagree that nothing is to be gained by pointing fingers or holding people accountable. This is major disaster that could have easily been prevented with due diligence, and could have been better dealt with after the fact with more accountability as well.

@Qingu I did read the article and that is where you will find numerous quotes that despite a lot of research and testing there was no way to conclusively determine the source of this outbreak. The real cause was thousands of people crammed together with little to no sanitation, clean water or medical support.

Again, people forget just how out of control things were in the days, weeks even months after the earthquake. There were no effective polices force, supplies sat at the airport because it was not safe to even off load into Port Eau Prince let alone remote villages. Anyone attempting to provide aid did so at extreme personal risk and many relief efforts were looted at gun point.

Plus they buried tens of thousands of bodies in mass graves and with rotting corpses lining the streets and no sanitation what so ever…disease will rule the day back then. I mean to this day people are still living in tents there. Who is to blame for all that?? Nepal?

@Cruiser, I’m not sure what you’re not getting. The cholera came from Nepal. It didn’t magically appear because of unsanitary conditions in Haiti.

Those unsanitary conditions helped spread the cholera. But it wouldn’t be there in the first place if it wasn’t for the Nepalese UN troops.

@Qingu I am just playing devils advocate here as everything I have read had said there is no conclusive definitive absolutely positively that the cholera came from Nepal and that is coming from your link and the CDC website link I provided. And given the conditions they had there and still to this day you cannot say definitively it wouldn’t have eventually shown up there anyway. In our sterile country, cholera magically showed up here in the aftermath of Katrina…who do we blame??? Nepal?

It is hard for me to believe that there was no cholera in Haiti before the U.N. showed up. I suspect that is why Fox never had a headline stating this. The Faux News network hates the U.N. and doesn’t care much for undomesticated black people so for them it would be the perfect storm. It is really hard to believe they passed it up.

@Ron_C I kind of agree. Things to consider. The outbreak started 10 months AFTER the earth quake so just try and quantify the thousands of people from so many countries who came into the country to provide relief to these people.

Also WHO says cholera is endemic in almost all developed countries and that common routes of infections today are from contaminated food sources and street vendor selling foods.