UNITED NATIONS, Jan 11 (NNN-Xinhua) — The international community is winning the battle against cholera in Haiti as new infection is rare, said a UN spokesman.
By December 2019, when the latest numbers were available, no positive tests for cholera had been reported for nearly 11 consecutive months, said Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
In the last week of December, there were five cholera tests in Haiti and all turned out to be negative, he said.
“That’s down from a peak, where there were some 18,000 cases a week. So in a sense, there’s been an extremely positive trend, a downward trend in the number of cholera cases, and that is thanks to the mobilization of the international community.”
Since the outbreak of cholera in Haiti in October 2010, the international community has spent about 705 million U.S. dollars in support of the Haitian government’s national plan to fight cholera. That includes 64 million dollars raised and mobilized by UN agencies, Dujarric told a daily press briefing.
The United Nations still needs about 20 million dollars to finalize the cholera response plan through 2022, and to try to maintain a zero transmission, he said. “We need a three-year zero benchmark for the WHO (World Health Organization) to declare Haiti cholera-free.”
The United Nations is working with communities that were most impacted by cholera to empower them to identify and implement projects that are most meaningful to them. The world body has expanded its community-led consultative process to about 25 communities throughout Haiti, he said.
The United Nations has not been able to mobilize enough funds on the so-call track 2 measures. “But I think it is very important to underscore the work that has been done with the leadership of the Haitian government in getting to that almost zero number of cholera cases,” said Dujarric. — NNN-AGENCIES