THE situation in Haiti is growing worse by the day and the international community, it seems, has lost the stomach to offer tangible assistance.

Last Thursday the United Nations (UN) made an appeal for millions of dollars from donors to help battle what is seen as an intensifying outbreak of cholera that has claimed almost 300 lives in that Caribbean nation.

According to Ms Ulrika Richardson, the UN’s humanitarian coordinator for Haiti, the organisation had raised only US$23.5 million of the US$145 million it asked for in a flash appeal to fight the epidemic.

“Cases continue and you have now 283 people that died from the illness, and we also have close to 12,000 people that have been hospitalised” since the resurgence of the disease in October, Agence France Presse reported Ms Richardson as telling journalists.

She said the epidemic has spread to eight of Haiti’s 10 regions in a “worrying trend”.

We are told that in mid-November the number of cholera-related deaths was 161 and hospitalisations stood at 7,500.

Ms Richardson said the UN is now organising its entire humanitarian response plan for Haiti for next year with a total value of US$719 million, which is twice this year’s outlay.

“It’s an indication of the humanitarian needs in Haiti so it is a worrying situation. The insecurity continues to be rampant,” she is quoted as saying.

The cholera crisis comes atop the worsening security situation which has resulted in more than 1,400 people being killed and over 1,000 kidnapped this year by gangs who, the UN has reported, also use sexual violence to intimidate Haitians.

Last Friday, Mr Volker Turk, the UN high commissioner for human rights, told a news conference in Geneva that the “multifaceted and protracted crisis” in Haiti “cannot be ignored”.

He charged that the gangs, which control more than 60 per cent of the capital where approximately 4.7 million people face acute hunger, are supported by economic and political elites.

If, as he says, the gangs are receiving that level of support, we endorse his statement that, “It is unconscionable that there are people benefiting from this endemic insecurity and the suffering of Haitians.”

It is, as we have stated before in this space, a most dreadful situation, and the Haitian Government appears powerless to address the crisis which mushroomed after the assassination of President Jovenel Moise in July 2021.

The country, we reiterate, needs urgent help.

The UN Security Council, which has proposed deploying an international force to stabilise the situation in Haiti, needs to take a decision, especially given Prime Minister Ariel Henry’s appeal for humanitarian assistance.

Four months ago we speculated that maybe the countries that can offer assistance, particularly in the area of security, are experiencing aid fatigue due to their own challenges with the novel coronavirus pandemic and the cold, hard fact that Haiti has proven a most difficult nation to settle down.

That, however, should not prevent them from trying to help. Haiti, after all, is populated by human beings, and people should not be left to languish in the conditions that now exist there.

We join Mr Turk in calling for a show of political courage and responsibility — at both the national and international level — to urgently address the crisis which has been spawned by social inequalities, corruption, and other ills.