Haiti Six Months Later

July 2010

The medical work of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in Haiti evolved during the first six months after a devastating earthquake hit on Jan. 12, 2010. Efforts grew from an emergency response to a wider range of medical and relief activities. “Haitians were the first to respond to this disaster and we have reinforced their effort with a massive aid intervention. Today, medical provision for Haitians has improved, and is certainly more accessible than before the earthquake, allowing poor people to receive proper health care,” explained MSF head of mission Stefano Zannini, who was already in Port-au-Prince when the earthquake killed or injured hundreds of thousands and left more than a million people without shelter.

An extraordinary number of foreign aid workers had to be brought into the country quickly; two months after the earthquake MSF had more than 350 international staff in Haiti, since many Haitian health workers were also victims of the earthquake. This put a huge strain on MSF’s human resources and management capacity. MSF was eventually able to reduce the number of foreign workers, as more Haitians were hired to work in the organization’s facilities. By the end of May 2010, 93 per cent of MSF staff on the ground were Haitians.

Six months after the earthquake, MSF published a report describing the organization’s largest ever emergency response. The report also describes the dire living conditions of Haitians six months on and provides an explanation of MSF’s commitment in years to come.

Key data on earthquake emergency relief published by MSF [PDF]

An interactive map showing MSF's response after the earthquake