First off, here are some ways to help. As Mac McClelland writes for Mother Jones:
- Donate to Partners in Health, which is mobilizing its people already on the ground, where they provide crucial health services, and Mercy Corps, which is dispatching an emergency team as I write this; both aid organizations already have special donation pages set up for the disaster. Also very deserving of your latte money is Doctors Without Borders, which has 813 staff in Haiti, and the Central Emergency Response Fund, a fast-acting UN donation facility.
- In theory, you can get help finding your friends/relatives in Haiti by calling the State Department at 888-407-4747, but the lines have been too flooded to get through.
Now for the really bad news:
This is from UN Dispatch from Mark Leon Goldberg:
On a conference call with Medicines sans Frontiere moments ago, a representative in Haiti said that all of the hospitals to which it would normally refer patients have either collapsed or are otherwise unusable. All MSF can do at the moment is administer first aid. There are no "referral" options for secondary care beyond first aid, but MSF is exploring options to deploy a "floating hospital" to Haiti.
Here's what CNN is reporting:
- Haiti prime minister tells CNN he believes well over 100,000 have died in earthquake.
- Catholic Relief Services staff member Karel Zelenka provided this account via e-mail. "Damage incredible all around ... Some major buildings are gone -- the hotel Montana, the National Palace etc... People have been screaming and chanting all over the place ... It is a disaster of the century, we should be prepared for thousands and thousands of dead and injured."
- More than 100 employees of U.N. mission unaccounted for.
- None of three aid centers run by Doctors without Borders in Haiti is operable, the group says.
Check back for more updates soon.