Save the Children Races to Children & Families

Save the Children has worked in Haiti continuously since 1978 and launches immediate relief for children affected by the island’s frequent natural disasters. Local staff members in Port-au-Prince have been joined by our international disaster response experts and are working around the clock and in coordination with the Haitian government, donors, nongovernmental organizations and communities to provide relief.

Save the Children’s Response:

• On January 18, Save the Children opened the first Child Friendly Space in a church serving as a temporary shelter. Child Friendly Spaces allow children to take part in structured, supportive activities and recover from what they’ve experienced. Kits for us to open 70 other spaces arrived in the Dominican Republic on January 18 for immediate transport to Port-au-Prince. Save the Children plans to open hundreds of these essential sites for children.

• Two mobile health clinics will begin serving the basic health needs of children and families right in their neighborhoods on January 19.

• Supplies of water and other materials arrived in the Dominican Republic on January 18 and are being forward to our Port-au-Prince office by truck.

• On January 17, we received as shipment of 16.5 tons of medical supplies from AmeriCares.

• On January 16, Save the Children distributed food and water to the L’Hopital de l’Espoire (Hope Hospital), that focuses on pediatric medicine and helps support two orphanages. The food was enough for 2,000 people; 40 families taking refuge near the hospital also received hygiene kits (containing such items as rubbing alcohol, soap, towels, baby wipes, sanitary napkins, shampoo, toilet paper, toothbrushes, toothpaste, disinfectant gel, chlorine, diapers and water). were distributed to vulnerable families taking refuge near the local hospital.

• Medical supplies were distributed by Save the Children’s response team and a partner agency on January 15 to 14 hospitals and clinics throughout the Port-au-Prince region.

• Our staff continues to assess the situation in Leogane and Petit Goave, both west of Portau- Prince and Jacmel, all of which have sustained heavy damage.

• In Jacmel, Save the Children staff is participating in coordination meetings, leading the coordination of the health relief effort and has been asked by UNICEF to work in two camps.

• Save the Children has committed to a five-year “build back better” initiative, which will take us from the relief and recovery phase to working with families to rebuild their communities. The strategy is similar to the five-year rebuilding initiative Save the Children launched in Aceh Province, Indonesia following the epic December 2004 tsunami.