Hurricane Matthew – CDC’s International Response
October 21st, 2016
Background
Category 4 Hurricane Matthew struck the south-west coast of Haiti at 0700 local time (1200 GMT) on 4 October. Wind speeds of 230km/h were recorded, causing widespread damage, flooding and displacement. The most affected departments are Grand Anse, South, Nippes and South East, where heavy floods were recorded. West and North West departments were also affected. The government of Haiti has issued a Red Alert and the Haiti National Emergency Operation Center has been activated. Estimates are that over 2 million people could be affected.
What is CDC doing?
Status of health facilities in Haiti
Source: ReliefWeb
CDC’s Emergency Response and Recovery Branch is leading efforts to support countries impacted by Hurricane Matthew. This includes coordinating with the US Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance(OFDA), the CDC Haiti Country Office, and other governmental and humanitarian partners to support response efforts. CDC’s country office in Haiti and teams of public health responders from Atlanta are focusing their efforts on assessing the public health impact of the storm and working with our Haitian partners to repair damaged public health systems. CDC health experts are in Haiti to assess the impact of the storm on health needs and infrastructure.
Current health priorities for the CDC Haiti country office are to ensure that those affected continue to receive health care; to collect data on cholera and other diseases that are prone to outbreaks, and to evaluate the interruption of safe water and sanitation supplies.
Hurricane Matthew and Haiti: Putting CDC Expertise to Work