Space Travel News  
EPIDEMICS
Haiti counts down to elections in a time of cholera

Haiti cholera toll hits 1,344: officials
Port-Au-Prince (AFP) Nov 22, 2010 - Haitian health officials said Monday that at least 1,344 people have died from a worsening cholera epidemic that has ravaged the country since mid-October. The toll, which registered cholera-related deaths and illnesses as of Friday, put the number of people who have been hospitalized with the disease at 23,377. Officials said the overall number of confirmed cases was nearly 57,000. Hardest-hit has been the northern region of Artibonite, where some 13,000 people have fallen ill with the disease, of whom 701 have succumbed to it.

UN says Nepalese peacekeepers to stay in Haiti
United Nations (AFP) Nov 22, 2010 - The United Nations will not move Nepalese peacekeepers out of Haiti despite deadly protests over accusations that they caused a cholera epidemic, a top UN official said Monday. "As of today, there are no plans to move them out," Tony Banbury, UN assistant secretary general for field planning, told AFP when asked about the future of the Nepalese contingent of just over 1,000 troops and police. The Nepalese in the northern city of Cap-Haitien have been under special protection since demonstrations started last week in which at least two people died. Some protesters have accused the Nepalese of bringing the cholera which has killed nearly 1,350 people. Nepal's UN mission has called the accusations "malicious".

"The country is suffering, there are people dying. "It is natural that Haitians want to know what the source is," said Banbury, who has been closely involved in the UN mission in Haiti since the devastating earthquake in January in which 250,000 people perished. "But we don't know and I understand from the epidemiologists that it is hard to determine. Different, very professional experts are pointing in very different directions," the UN official added. "We have to focus on the response, as important as it is to figure out where it came from." "Every minute we waste on doing something like this probably means Haitians are going to die. This is a really big emergency and the actual numbers of deaths and reported cases are significantly larger than the reported numbers -- so more people are dying than we realize and more people are contracting it," Banbury said. UN spokesmen have stressed that tests carried out at the Nepalese camp in Cap-Haitien have all been negative.

Fourth cholera case found in Dominican Republic
Santo Domingo (AFP) Nov 22, 2010 - Authorities in the Dominican Republic, which shares the Caribbean island of Hispaniola with cholera-stricken Haiti, have discovered a fourth case of the disease, officials said Monday. Dominican Health Minister Bautista Rojas said the victim, a 20-year-old woman who resides in the region around the capital Santo Domingo, was being treated at a local hospital and was not considered to be in danger. The illness was confirmed "on Saturday during a routine physical exam," Rojas told reporters. The Dominican Republic has stepped up efforts to stop the advance of cholera from Haiti after discovering a the highly contagious disease within its own borders last week. The first Dominican case was a 32-year-old Haitian-born man believed to have contracted the disease while on vacation in Haiti. President Leonel Fernandez last week held an emergency strategy meeting with his cabinet to discuss ways to combat the disease, and authorities have tightened border controls.
by Staff Writers
Port-Au-Prince (AFP) Nov 22, 2010
Haiti counted down towards weekend elections Monday as the death toll from a spiraling cholera epidemic neared 1,350, fueling debate over delaying the key polls in the quake-hit nation.

Haitian radio reported that demonstrators in the southern town of Miragoane had erected barricades to protest against the presence of electoral registration officers they accuse of being fraudulent government lackeys.

Health officials said at least 1,344 people had died from the worsening cholera epidemic that has ravaged the country since mid-October -- a rise of 94 from a day earlier. More than 57,000 cases have now been confirmed.

Amid fears the disease could spread more quickly in an election environment when people have to move and congregate, four of the 19 presidential candidates published a letter this weekend demanding the polls be put on hold.

"We are calling on the authorities to push back the date of the elections, to establish and publish a battle plan against the cholera epidemic that is threatening the life of all Haitians," wrote Josette Bijou, Gerard Blot, Garaudy Laguerre and Wilson Jeudy, all outsiders in the poll.

But former prime minister Jacques-Edouard Alexis, a leading candidate, told a press conference in Port-au-Prince Monday that the elections must go ahead as planned so President Rene Preval leaves office as scheduled on February 7.

"That's why it's necessary to hold the elections, and people should go out and vote," he said. Haitians must "not allow this election to end in contested results. We will not accept a candidate that is an understudy of Preval."

Nearly 4.7 million Haitians are eligible to vote in Sunday's elections, which will also see 11 of the country's 30 senators and all 99 parliamentary deputies chosen.

The next president faces the mammoth task of rebuilding a traumatized nation of 10 million that was already the poorest in the Americas even before a January earthquake flattened Port-au-Prince and claimed 250,000 lives.

Billions of dollars of international aid money could be squandered if no credible government emerges to replace Preval, who was himself under fire for his management of the cholera outbreak.

The build-up to the elections has been complicated by anti-UN riots in several regions, particularly in the north where aid agencies complain their cholera response is being badly hampered.

UN peacekeepers from Nepal are accused of bringing cholera into the country -- the epidemic erupted suspiciously near their base in the central Artibonite River valley and many Haitians are convinced they are to blame.

"As of today, there are no plans to move them out," Tony Banbury, UN assistant secretary general for field planning, told AFP when asked about the future of the Nepalese contingent of just over 1,000 troops and police.

"The country is suffering, there are people dying. It is natural that Haitians want to know what the source is," Banbury said in New York.

"But we don't know and I understand from the epidemiologists that it is hard to determine. Different, very professional experts are pointing in very different directions."

The Conference of Haitian Bishops urged the electorate on Sunday not to participate in violence and to "choose leaders who will work for all the people."

UN peacekeepers in armored trucks fired tear gas on the crowds in running clashes that lasted several hours in Port-au-Prince on Thursday. This followed days of rioting that left at least three people dead in northern Cap-Haitien.

Port-au-Prince had been seen as particularly at risk of widespread infection because of the crowded and unsanitary conditions endured by those living in the squalid, makeshift tent cities.

But less than 80 deaths have been recorded so far in the capital and the humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders (MSF), which has taken a lead role in treating the disease there, says the situation in the city is stabilizing.

"Cholera arrived two-and-a-half weeks ago in Port-au-Prince. At the start the number of cases was doubling each day. Since last week it has stabilized," Isabelle Janson told AFP at a hospital in the heart of the Cite-Soleil slum.

Four isolated cholera cases have been found in the neighboring Dominican Republic and two in the US state of Florida.

Senior UN officials have meanwhile expressed disappointment with the international response to its appeal for 164 million dollars to help Haiti combat the cholera epidemic.



Share This Article With Planet Earth
del.icio.usdel.icio.us DiggDigg RedditReddit
YahooMyWebYahooMyWeb GoogleGoogle FacebookFacebook



Related Links
Epidemics on Earth - Bird Flu, HIV/AIDS, Ebola



Memory Foam Mattress Review
Newsletters :: SpaceDaily :: SpaceWar :: TerraDaily :: Energy Daily
XML Feeds :: Space News :: Earth News :: War News :: Solar Energy News


EPIDEMICS
Fourth cholera case found in Dominican Republic
Santo Domingo (AFP) Nov 22, 2010
Authorities in the Dominican Republic, which shares the Caribbean island of Hispaniola with cholera-stricken Haiti, have discovered a fourth case of the disease, officials said Monday. Dominican Health Minister Bautista Rojas said the victim, a 20-year-old woman who resides in the region around the capital Santo Domingo, was being treated at a local hospital and was not considered to be in d ... read more







EPIDEMICS
Ukraine Delivers Taurus II Launch Vehicle's First Stage To US

Ball Aerospace's First Standard Interface Vehicle Set To Launch

ILS Proton Launches Lightsquared Satellite

Russia Launches Advanced US Telecom Satellite

EPIDEMICS
Leicester Scientists Involved In Development Of New Breed Of Space Vehicle

IceBite Blog: Setting Up An IceBreaker

Camera On Curiosity's Arm Will Magnify Clues In Rocks

Breaking The Ice In Antarctica

EPIDEMICS
Mining On The Moon Is A Not-So-Distant Possibility

A Softer Landing on the Moon

New Analysis Explains Formation Of Lunar Farside Bulge

New type of moon rock identified

EPIDEMICS
Kuiper Belt Of Many Colors

Reaching The Mid-Mission Milestone On The Way To Pluto

New Horizons Student Dust Counter Instrument Breaks Distance Record

Nitrogen Methane Dominate Icy Surface Of Eris

EPIDEMICS
Planet From Another Galaxy Discovered

First glimpse of a planet from another galaxy

Eartly Dust Tails Point To Alien Worlds

U.K. astronomers see 'snooker' star system

EPIDEMICS
NASA Test Fires New Rocket Engine for Commercial Space Vehicle

Rocketdyne To Perform Risk-Reduction Tests On 3GRB Engine

SpaceShipTwo designer Rutan retiring

Acceptance Testing On Second R-4D Development Engine Completed

EPIDEMICS
Two Telescopes For Tiangong

Chinese Female Taikonaut Identified

Tiangong Space Lab Spurs China Space PR Blitz

China Announces Success Of Chang'e-2 Lunar Probe Mission

EPIDEMICS
Comet Snowstorm Engulfs Hartley 2

Japan confirms space probe brought home asteroid dust

Hayabusa Spacecraft Returns Asteroid Artifacts From Space

Ikeya-Murakami: The New Comet On The Cosmic Block


The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2010 - SpaceDaily. AFP and UPI Wire Stories are copyright Agence France-Presse and United Press International. ESA Portal Reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement,agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by SpaceDaily on any Web page published or hosted by SpaceDaily. Privacy Statement