The United Nations has taken the blame for helping import the cholera epidemic that spread across Haiti nearly six years ago, killing thousands of people. Cholera has claimed the lives of more than 9,000 Haitians in the past six years and new infections continue to be reported.
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“We look forward to the new response the United Nations plans to unveil, and we continue to call on the organization to devote additional resources”, said Dr. Gary Gottlieb of Boston-based Partners in Health, an NGO which operates clinics and hospitals in 12 locations in Haiti.
“With a rainy season that will last through November or possibly December, we worry that cholera will be especially deadly this year, easily killing 400 or 500 people”, he said.
“We will decide how to proceed based on whether the U.N.’s actions fulfill the cholera victims’ rights to an effective remedy”, Concannon said in a statement.
The organization reports that there have been more some 10,000 cholera-related deaths since the outbreak in 2010, though Doctors Without Borders have argued that the actual death toll is likely higher. A USA federal appeals court has upheld on Thursday, Aug. 18, 2016, the United Nations immunity from a damage claim filed on behalf of 5,000 cholera victims who blame the U.N. for an epidemic of the deadly disease in Haiti.
They say U.N. peacekeepers were responsible for introducing a cholera epidemic in Haiti in October 2010, following the massive natural disaster that hit the impoverished Caribbean nation.
Thousands of Haitian victims a year ago filed a class action suit against the United Nations in the U.S. Southern District federal court.
But lawyers for the plaintiffs have long argued that the United Nations is not entitled to immunity under the convention because it has failed to establish any kind of settlement process for the cholera victims, as required by the same convention.
He said the package that the secretary-general is developing “would provide material assistance and support to those Haitians most directly affected by cholera”.
However, Mr Haq reiterated that the UN’s legal position in on diplomatic immunity and possible compensation “has not changed”.
Some 72 percent of Haitians have no toilets at home and, according to the United Nations, 42 percent still lack access to drinking water.
Already one of the world’s poorest countries, Haiti was still reeling from a devastating natural disaster on January 12, 2010 that killed more than 200,000 people when its misery was compounded by the cholera outbreak. Sewage is rarely treated and safe water remains inaccessible to many.
“The United Nations also intends to intensify its support to reduce, and ultimately end, the transmission of cholera, improve access to care and treatment and address the longer-term issues of water, sanitation and health systems in Haiti”, said the statement. They have three months to make up their mind over whether to file an appeal to the US Supreme Court or not.
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He called a draft report and its recommendations from a human rights rapporteur recently received “a valuable contribution to the United Nations as we work towards a significantly new set of United Nations actions”.
