Photo: Due to living conditions for earthquake survivors and the general population that help enable the spread of cholera in Haiti, the disease remains a lethal threat two years after the epidemic first appeared in the county. Haiti 2012 © Mathieu Fortoul/MSF

For Haitians, Cholera Remains a Major Public Health Problem

It’s been two years since a cholera epidemic first swept through Haiti, infecting hundreds of thousands of people who’d never before encountered the disease. It was clear that cholera was likely to be a recurring issue in Haiti, but even today, new patients cannot be certain that they will get the treatment they need, and little has been done to improve the environmental conditions that enable the continued spread of the disease.

MSF has treated 12,000 cholera patients in five cholera treatment centers since the beginning of the year. During the recent spike of new cases in May, MSF treated more than 70 percent of the total number of patients registered in Port-au-Prince.