Thousands of people have been displaced from their homes due to gang violence/ invasion. Many cannot access their primary care clinic or their clinic has closed, also due to gang hostility. This is not a new story. More of the same. Now we are starting to see poor outcomes of those with chronic disease. Our clinic has seen an influx of new patients. Hypertension, diabetes and heart failure. Many of these people have not been able to access health care in the past 6 months to a year, nor have they been able to find the medication they normally take. We have seen numerous patients with systolic blood pressures greater than 200. This is extremely high. And unfortunately, we are seeing patients with significant renal failure, strokes, heart attacks. We are limited in our ability to treat these complications. The Haitian healthcare system was limited in its ability to treat these complications before the era of the gangs, and now…

We have been fortunate that we have thus far been able to find and purchase medications to continue our work. We have medications to treat hypertension, decompensated heart failure and diabetes. The goal is to treat chronic illness and in doing so, prevent complications, or to prevent their recurrence if they have already occurred. It is rather overwhelming for the patients and for our staff. Please pray that people who need help will come to us sooner rather than later. And please pray for our staff- for strength, compassion, wisdom and the ability to process sad story after sad story, to grieve, to heal and keep going. The need and the heart break seems never ending. Fortunately, God has all that we need.