COLUMBIA, S.C. (ABP) — Baptist leaders in North America described a mode of "hurry up and wait" for long-term relief efforts in Haiti during a Feb. 11 conference call.
Disaster-relief representatives for several member groups of the North American Baptist Fellowship have been meeting weekly by teleconference since Jan. 14, two days after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake killed more than 217,000 Haitians and left 1.2 million without shelter.
A month after the disaster, most Baptist personnel ministering in Haiti are working in medical-mission or water-purification teams. North Carolina Baptist Men dispatched the sixth medical team Feb. 9, with other teams scheduled to leave for Haiti on Feb. 14 and Feb. 19.
American Baptist Churches USA is sending medical teams to Haiti on a weekly basis. Stephen James, a medical doctor living in Haiti and his wife, Nancy, a registered nurse, are dually appointed by American Baptists and the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.
Herb Rogers, a special assistant for Haiti for American Baptist Churches, was scheduled to go to Haiti Feb. 15 for two months for assessment and coordinating work with ABC partners and missionaries in Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
Scott Hunter, one of CBF's former field personnel in Southeast Asia assigned to Haiti for three months, was reported to be working to secure a permanent staging area for relief efforts about an hour southwest of Port-au-Prince. That would open the door for mission teams, perhaps within a week to 10 days.
Along with medical care, an immediate need following a natural disaster is safe drinking water. Texas Baptist Men are helping to tackle that problem by installing water purification systems to be followed by distribution of water filters that will provide clean drinking water for a family of four for six months.
Instead of sending volunteers, the Lott Carey Foreign Mission Convention is providing cash grants for families in Haiti, where most people live on less than $2 a day. Four of the 22 churches in Lott Carey's partner network in Haiti, L'Union Strategique des Eglesis Baptistes d'Haiti, were destroyed in the earthquake.
Meanwhile, a blizzard gripping the east coast of the United States hindered Baptists there further. Paul Montacute, director of Baptist World Aid, relief-and-development arm of the Baptist World Alliance, lamented that instead of working in Haiti he was talking on the conference call from his home in Washington, D.C.
In the Baptist General Association of Virginia, which is collecting medical supplies, some churches have not met for three weeks.
Another problem facing relief efforts is transportation. Though costly, there are ways to fly aid to Haiti, but once there ground transportation is harder to come by. Some groups reported buying vehicles in Santo Domingo and driving across the border into Haiti.
CBF is shipping medical supplies to the Jameses. If they have more of a particular item than they need, they share it with other doctors.
Apart from medical supplies, the Baptist leaders discouraged churches from collecting supplies but to instead focus on cash donations to reputable organizations and to pray for transportation costs.
Lott Carey officials also raised alarm about an e-mail from one colleague reporting that patients sent for treatment in the Dominican Republic are coming home with amputated limbs, while medical care on U.S. ships is saving limbs. The convention urged members to write Congress to investigate and seek a better remedy. If mass amputations are necessary, officials said, the international community should work with the Haitian government to provide therapy and prosthetic limbs.
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Bob Allen is senior writer for Associated Baptist Press.