Conversation with a Haitian Friend about the Virus--June 2020
Photo by John Carroll
I called a Haitian friend this morning on WhatsApp because I wanted to check on his two-year-old boy who has had abdominal pain, vomiting, and diarrhea for several days. This morning he took him to an emergency department in Port au Prince which is still functioning even amid the mayhem of COVID 19 and the massive breakdown of Haitian government and Haitian society.
I will refer to my friend as Jean.
During our conversation, I asked Jean about his view of coronavirus. (Haiti has about 2,500 confirmed cases as of yesterday.) Jean told me that when Haitians are sick now with COVID 19 symptoms, they are afraid to go to any hospital or even a dedicated COVID 19 center. They are afraid of the stigma attached to the disease. (MetropoleHaiti.com reported yesterday that a 50-year-old man with an unproven case of COVID-19 was burned to death inside his home by assailants in Carrefour.)
Jean told me that Haitians with suspected COVID 19 also fear going to the hospital because they think they will die in the hospital. They prefer to stay home and drink tea made from leaves with curative properties.
Jean also said that in certain neighborhoods in Port, such as Pelerin and Delmas, there have been situations where sick people have called to be tested for COVID 19 in their homes only to be burglarized by armed men disguised as health workers. Interestingly, this crime is not being reported in Cite Soleil because Jean said that, “Soleil is at war right now with gangs shooting at each other and cops being killed.”
John A. Carroll, MD
www.haitianhearts.org
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Comments--
A Haitian friend of mine told me she couldn’t possibly go to the hospital because they would give her a shot that would kill her. I tried to calm her and got no where. She said that the US doctors were killing people and they were doing it in Haiti, too. I’ve known her for 35 years but she truely believes this.