How are they in Haiti?
For the last ten years we have lived immersed in violence. We suffer horrors. The capital is surrounded by armed gangs who kill and kidnap people, and rape suitable girls.
No one puts order?
Nobody wants it. The population lives gripped by fear and stress, and this has caused a massive and catastrophic flight of the country’s most competent people.
When you were put in charge of the pediatric hospital St. damien?
At the age of 32, twenty years ago, I joined as a pediatrician and then created the oncology unit, but I have been its executive director for a year.
Do you remember your first day on the job?
perfectly The hospital treats vulnerable children from poor families, and on my first day I saw children die who could have lived. There was no one in the country capable of treating a child with cancer. He stole from me.
And she decided to become an oncologist?
Yes, I started studying and then opened the pediatric oncology department. I only had one bed, now I have 17.
Thanks to state funds?
No, healthcare is not the Government’s priority. We serve 80,000 children from the suburbs of the Haitian capital thanks to the international organization Nuestros Pequeños Hermanos.
What do you face every day?
To death In Haiti, you go out into the streets and you don’t know if you will return home because the violence and kidnappings are very high.
From home to hospital and from hospital to home?
Of course, but the hospital is in a very dangerous area, surrounded by armed gangs. Sometimes when there are clashes we have to stay there for two or three days.
A difficult life.
Death is very present, at any moment an armed gang can break into your house and do whatever they want with you.
Have you ever thought about leaving?
No, my children are grown up and studying abroad. They are out of danger. They want one or two million dollars for a kidnapping. I insist to my family that if they kidnap me, they don’t pay, because that is feeding a vicious circle.
Aren’t you afraid?
Haitian women are the pillar of society, in the hospital there are more women working than men, but, together with the girls, we are victims of assaults and rapes.
Sad nonsense.
Being a mother is a complex exercise, we suffer from insecurity, kidnappings and lack of access to health, not to mention the high cost of living.
How do you combat anxiety and stress?
I don’t think about negative things, I don’t anticipate what will come. I pray before I go to work so that nothing happens to me, and before I go back I do the same. And when I get home I meditate.
To calm your nerves?
Yes, and I also implemented it in the hospital, an hour of stress relief for all the doctors.
Anxiety among healthcare workers must be high.
A lot, I try to laugh, to tell and listen to jokes. I am a very funny person, for me there are many opportunities to laugh despite the difficult situations we live in every day.
Be bitter the least.
A smile is hope, and there are always reasons to smile. It makes me very happy to see a sick child arrive and recover, because it shows you that you have been useful for something.
Have you suffered death threats?
Yes, it is common. The last director had to leave the country when she wanted to reform the hospital and was threatened with death, there are violent people inside the hospital. They kidnap teachers, public employees, doctors.
And how do children grow?
In childhood they suffer a lot: hunger, disease… Teenagers, if they haven’t had the chance to develop in a quiet family environment and receive minimal training, join gangs.
Many health centers in the country have closed.
80% are private and are in crisis because they do not have professionals, and the public sector is perpetually on strike and without material. They have closed 70% of the centers.
Describe the situation to me.
Families can’t buy soap to wash, garbage isn’t collected for fear of armed gangs, schools don’t work continuously, and we don’t have clean water. Cholera is back.
Where did you study medicine?
In Cuba, over the course of ten years, but I never considered that I would not return, and I want my children to return, we must join forces to stabilize and pacify this country.
Do you hold out hope?
Yes, as Haitians we must have an awakening, and if the educated people do not leave the country we will succeed.
