Food Aid Ceases

Its now business as usual for the Haitian people, that means that there is much more uncertainty and back to living literally from day to day. Free food handouts have been withdrawn.

Since the last entry we have met a couple of times, and in all honesty we are struggling to come up with the best way of assisting the country. More information has been coming in and we now know that apparently the Dental School is still intact. Indeed we have been in touch with the Vice Dean a Dr Samuel E Prophete.

It seems that before the earthquake they were some progress in Dental Public Health with the coming appointment of a Dental Officer, however we can reasonably assume that any activity has since ceased with the present circumstance.

Dr Prophete has expressed an interest in working with us, and this may well be an avenue to pursue. We are thinking that perhaps we may assist with materials and equipment and also possibly education.

Some of our thoughts are being directed towards the immediate needs of the people of Haiti, we have identified a hospital which is run by a church group which would welcome us. The unit which was donated by Paterson will be in town shortly and will be assembled and checked out fully before we send it down possibly to this clinic.

Our contact there is Dr Jackie Solages who has advised us that there are two free clinics for the public, one at St Damiens (church supported charity) and another in a place called Kenscoff.
I believe they need help both in terms of equipment but also monies for staff, both dentists and assistants.

One thing we are very sure of is that the need is immense, we have to be very selective to see that we not only assist with immediate issues but also be aware that we should allow the people of Haiti to participate and hopefully take ownership. They can then be slowly left with the education, training and tools to move on. We would then reduce their depency on aid.

Discussions have taken place with a view to establishing charitable status and we think we have good news on that effort. We believe that its possible to set this up ourselves and thereby maintain control over our own funds and being able to direct them as we see fit. A meeting is planned shortly to try and put this issue to bed.

A bit a media blitz at the coming Oral Health Convention is planned and we hope we shall have our charitable foundation status at that time so we can canvas our membership. Dr Hiltz is the prime mover on this. We would also like to approach the Dentist to see if anyone would be interested to travel to Haiti to donate their time.