By Claudy Junior Pierre, Le Nouvelliste, Jan. 27, 2023
“On Thursday, January 26, armed men entered the Raoul Pierre Louis public hospital supported by Médecins Sans Frontières in the commune of Carrefour. They took a patient with gunshot wounds from the emergency room and coldly executed him. This is the second incident of the same order in the space of six months: MSF is therefore forced to suspend all its activities in this hospital", informs the organization Médecins sans Frontières in a note made public on Friday, January 27, 2023.
"In the middle of the afternoon, three hooded and armed men burst into the Raoul Pierre Louis hospital. It was in the emergency room that the assailants seized a bedridden patient on a stretcher. He had just been admitted for a gunshot wound. According to Benoît Vasseur, coordinator of the MSF mission in Haiti, they "took him out of the hospital and finished him off with a bullet to the head about ten meters from the establishment",
“This is the second time that such an incident has occurred in this same hospital. We remain once again appalled by this type of punitive act which flouts humanitarian principles as well as the protection that each patient should benefit from within any health structure” Vasseur continued, referring to the violent execution of a patient also discharged from the hospital emergency room on August 14, 2022.
“Faced with this unacceptable act of violence, we have no choice but to temporarily suspend our activities at the Raoul Pierre Louis hospital, as long as we are unable to guarantee the safety of our teams and our patients" he added.
"Médecins Sans Frontières teams have been working tirelessly for more than 30 years in Haiti to treat the poorest communities. MSF urges armed men to respect the medical mission; wounded and the personnel who care for them, the centers which receive them, and the ambulances that transport them. This sad event occurs during a day marked by demonstrations and riots which broke out in several districts of the capital and its surroundings", Vasseur explained.
At the Médecins Sans Frontières emergency center in Turgeau, six gunshot wounds were received in just a few hours, including a high school student who had already died on his arrival. Access to emergency care must be protected more than ever.
A hospital manager contacted by Le Nouvelliste admits that the suspension of MSF activities in Raoul Pierre Louis will have a negative impact on the normal functioning of the hospital.
"The organization Médecins sans Frontières supports the hospital in supplying the generators with fuel to the tune of one million three hundred thousand gourdes per month. It also provides fundamental logistical support for the proper functioning of the hospital and gives support technical service in the emergency department of the said hospital", indicating services will slow considerably.
Translated by CHIP editors
Posted Feb. 10, 2023