News Updates

October 10, 2011 - HAITI GROUP SEES JUMP IN CHOLERA CASES IN PORT-AU-PRINCE - The number of cholera cases seen in the Haitian capital has jumped about threefold in recent weeks. Four treatment centers in the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area have handled as many as 850 cases in a single week lately. That compares with about 250 cases a week more than a month ago. Read more (here)

May 27, 2011 - Evictions ramp up for Haitian quake victims. The destruction of about 200 makeshift tents in the Delmas 3 neighborhood was the latest in a string of evictions across this earthquake-ravaged capital where victims of the hemisphere’s worst natural disaster are being forced off public and private property with little or no warning. Read more (here)

December 31, 2010 - HAITI'S cholera death toll has soared in recent days with 3,333 people dead. The figures, released yesterday, included a one-day record high for the daily number of fatalities since the outbreak erupted in mid-October. Cholera, which causes potentially deadly cases of diarrhoea, often strikes in poor countries where there is a high danger of an epidemic due to inadequate sanitation and limited access to clean water. Read more (here)

November 23, 2010 - Cholera outbreak spreading faster than predicted. The cholera epidemic in Haiti is spreading twice as fast as had been estimated and is likely to result in hundreds of thousands of cases in the coming months, the UN says. Read more of this BBC article (here)

October 10, 2010 - Nine months after the quake, over a million people are still homeless in Haiti. Haiti looks like the quake could have been last month. I visited Port au Prince shortly after the quake and much of the destruction then looks the same nine months later. The Associated Press reports only two percent of the rubble has been removed and only 13,000 temporary shelters have been constructed. Not a single cent of the US aid pledged for rebuilding has arrived in Haiti. In the last few days the US pledged it would put up 10% of the billion dollars in reconstruction aid promised. Only 15 percent of the aid pledged by countries and organizations around the world has reached the country so far. Read more (here)

September 25, 2010 - Storm shreds aging tents in Haiti earthquake camps. The sudden, powerful storm that ripped through Haiti's battered capital destroyed thousands of tents in the homeless camps where more than 1.3 million people live eight months after the earthquake destroyed their homes. Read more from this AP article (here)

August 1, 2010 - Frustrations continue to grow in and around Corail as residents wait on temporary plywood shelters that have been slow in coming. Nine months after Haiti's earthquake, thousand of homeless people still sleep in makeshift tents. Read more from this Kansas City Star article (here)

July 11, 2010 - In Haiti, the Displaced Are Left Clinging to the Edge - Hundreds of displaced families live perilously in a single file of flimsy shanties planted along the median strip of a heavily congested coastal road. Read more from this New York Times story (here)

July 11, 2010 - Six months after Haitian earthquake, many barriers to recovery - Leo, 33, a computer technician, wonders how much longer they have to live this way or where else they can go. "Since January 12th, I've never received any aid," Leo says in French. "Ever since this dramatic event, it's like life has no meaning anymore. Nothing has changed in six months." Read more from this USA Today story (here)

May 25, 2010 - Contrasting Relief Camps Showcase Haiti Challenges, "In the shattered Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince, two camps for earthquake survivors are situated side by side, and they couldn't be more different. One built by the Haitian government is clean, new, orderly and empty. The other is the largest informal settlement in the city. It has turned into a bustling slum that reeks of raw sewage and is overflowing with people. Read more from this NPR article (here)

May 10, 2010 - Seeing God's face in Haiti's children. "Could we in America have such a loving attitude in the face of hardship and poverty?  We have so much to learn. From where we stand, we might see rubble, weeds, a tin can and a dead bird, but the children see house, flower, truck, airplane. Read more of this Episcopal Life Online article (here).

April 29, 2010 - Tensions rise over Haiti tent camps. "Across the Port-au-Prince region, Haitian and international officials are confronting the tricky task of balancing the needs of more than a million homeless with the urge of many others to resume a more normal life months after much of the capital and its outskirts were flattened by the Jan. 12 quake." Go to the LA Times article (here).

April 25, 2010 - "We'd thank God for a glass of water,". A tale of two refugee camps and how thousands of homeless Haitians live without an effective aid and relief system. MSNBC article (here)

April 15, 2010 - “What is clear is that there is need to keep remembering Haiti, there is a need to continue maintaining our attention on Haiti and to keep it in focus...” Article from the UN News Center (here)

April 12, 2010 - Spring is the time when farmers in Haiti plant about sixty percent of their crops. But this spring is a struggle with disaster. An estimated six hundred thousand people left Port-au-Prince for the countryside. Experts say it will be difficult to feed them. Gerald Murray at the University of Florida is an expert on Haiti. Professor Murray says many rural families have taken in relatives and friends who lost homes and jobs. "There may be enough to eat for a while," he says, "but before too long there may be hunger." Read more (here)

April 4, 2010 - Haiti's rainy reason could mean suffering is in the forecast. "In post-earthquake Port-au-Prince, rainstorms -- including several brief ones over the past week -- lift refuse out of piles and spread it across streets and camps. With the ooze -- an awful melange of rotting fruit, chicken bones and human waste -- comes a smell that brings to mind spoiled milk and gangrenous wounds." Go to the Washington Post story (here).

April 1, 2010 - Separated children in Haiti often not welcome home. Washington Post story on the plight of orphans and poor children in Haiti. (here)

March 25, 2010 - "The emergency in Haiti isn’t over. It’s getting worse, as the outside world’s attention fades away." New York Times editorial details the reality of life for more than one million people! (here)

March 21, 2010 - March 21, 2010 - Haiti races to house post-quake homeless before the rainy season. - The Haiti government needs 40,000 dwellings for 200,000 people currently homeless in flood- or mudslide-prone areas or in the most congested tent cities. Can it do that by the time the rainy season starts in early April? Read more (here).

March 8, 2010 - Dale and Nathan Hipp have safely arrived in Haiti. Trevor Hipp will be maintaining an online journal (click here) and will be reporting out on their work as they are able to get information out. Please pray for the Hipp family for a safe and blessed trip, for their partners they will be seeing on the ground, and for all of the children and people of Haiti.

March 6, 2010 - New York Times article - PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Thousands of schools in and around this devastated capital could remain closed for months or never reopen, according to Haitian and UN education officials. That leaves vast numbers of children languishing in camps or working in menial jobs as they struggle to survive. Read more here.

February 25, 2010 - PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (BP)--A reported 40,127 Haitians have made professions of faith in Jesus Christ since a major earthquake hit the impoverished nation in January, according to pastors and directors of missions within the Confraternite Missionaire Baptiste d'Haiti (CMBH). Read more here.

February 23, 2010 - HAITIANS SEEK SHELTER AS RAIN, AFTERSHOCKS ROCK ISLAND - Less than a quarter of the 1.3 million Haitians who need shelter have it. And with the rainy season upon the quake-stricken country, aid groups are urgently asking for help. Read more here.

February 22, 2010 - THE OAKLAND MARYLAND COLLECTION DAY WAS A SUCCESS!!! - A BIG thank you goes out to all of those who donated items and offerings to our effort. We are close to filling a container and all of the blessings we are receiving from God will soon be on its way to Haiti.

February 2, 2010 - A Washington Post article reports " Emergency assistance still hasn't reached many Haitians". Emergency food is is being provided to more than one million people. The need for supplies and assistance in Haiti is urgent. Link to the Post article here.

January 30, 2010 - A US container line has agreed to ship containers for us to Haiti. This secure service will allow us to personally meet the shipments at Port-au-Prince and accompany it to the site. Calls for help are going out to churches, businesses, organizations and people in the Tri-State area. Watch for news on collection points, dates and times.

January 24, 2010 - Pastor Luc is safe. However, the church and training facility have collapsed. Families from the church have been killed and most are without homes. Link to blog article here.

 

Photographs courtesy Paul Durham, Heritage Resource Photography, copyright 2010 - all rights reserved

Contact Information

Vine Abiding Ministries, Inc.
RR 1, Box 213F
Burlington, WV 26710

Phone  (304) 266-8800

Email here

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"Defend the cause of the weak and fatherless; maintain the rights of the poor and oppressed. Rescue the weak and needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked." Psalm 82:3-4