A Plea for Haiti
03/30/2010
Margaret Aguirre of International Medical Corps' first team reflects on 10 weeks post-quake
March 30 The Ghosts of Haiti
March 24 Actress Sienna Miller: "A Plea for Haiti"
March 5 A Promise Made, A Promise Kept
Feb. 23 Not Another Concrete Graveyard
Feb. 15 The Rainy Season Begins
Jan. 21 Actress Sienna Miller Gives Voice to Haitians
Jan. 19 From the Rubble, a Five-Year-Old Survives
Jan. 13 Hotel Turned Hospital
Donate to International Medical Corps' Work in Haiti
March 30
The Ghosts of Haiti
By Margaret Aguirre, Direct of Global Communications
Then: Patients await surgery in the "forest" of University Hospital in downtown Port-au-Prince, just days after the earthquake.
I walked the grounds of the main hospital in downtown Port-au-Prince, surrounded by ghosts - images and sounds rushing back from the early days right after the 7.0 earthquake here 10 weeks ago.
I was here with our Emergency Response Team from International Medical Corps the day after the January 12 disaster. In the area we dubbed the "forest," about 500 patients had lain on the grass or on hospital beds, many with infected crush injuries teeming with maggots, their blank stares reflecting how numb they had become from the pain - or their faces contorted in pain. Moans, screams, praying, chanting, sometimes just eerie silence.
On this day, the forest was quiet. No live patients lying next to dead ones, bloody bandages and IV bags strewn about. No doctors and nurses frantically wedging themselves into tight corners to dress and disinfect, transport or declare dead. Today, all I saw were tidy tents with a few post-operative cases inside. Sturdy chairs outside the tents provided a comfortable waiting area for loved ones. The place looked small, simple, organized. All I could hear was the breeze in the trees.
I stood there, awed by the transformation, and wept for those who lived here and went home, those who lived here and had no home to return here, and those who died here.
I exited the forest and walked toward the pediatric ward. How many times had I walked this path - to the pediatric and maternity wards, the supply warehouse, the blood bank, the U.S. military's hospital headquarters? I looked to my right, waiting to come upon the nursing college, where as many as a hundred nurses had perished that day, where every day the powerful smell of their decomposing bodies hung in the air. As I passed an empty lot, covered in a neat layer of rocks and crumbled cinderblock, cordoned off by concertina wire, I yelled out to my colleagues, "Where is the nursing college?! It was right here!" This was the former nursing college... razed... gone... the bodies and bones of Haiti's future interred underneath.
Time marches on.
We then walked to the two ICU tents, where a group of doctors and nurses rotating through from Chicago-Rush Hospital, the University of Connecticut, and other institutions were tackling about 30 urgent cases, from typhoid fever to congestive heart failure. Suddenly, as I stood next to one woman's bed I saw her begin seizing. She had gone into renal failure. A team of about eight doctors and nurses responded quickly. Amid the commotion, her husband and son moved outside the ICU tent, where they gazed inside watching in terror, praying she would live. The medical team administered CPR, gave the woman epinephrine injections, and after about 15 minutes of vigorous, sweat-inducing pumping on her chest they were able to revive her. She was dead, then she was alive.
I think back to the early days at the hospital - we didn't have any of the equipment I see before me today: dialysis machines, portable ultrasounds. Amputations were done without anesthesia. Antibiotics and powerful painkillers were precious and ran out quickly.
In the bed across from her was a beautiful, young woman who had suffered massive complications in childbirth and lay limp as her mother and grandmother together washed her face, massaged her limbs, mixed a little food for her that she tried to eat without choking. It was a striking contrast between medical advances hard at work on one side of the room, and simple, loving care on the other.
The fact is countless patients who've come through University hospital would not be alive today if International Medical Corps weren't there. We're treating anywhere from 500 to 800 patients a day there - plus another 1,200 or so at our mobile clinics in 18 sites in earthquake-affected areas across Haiti.
Now: The "forest" today. Patients no longer lying on the ground.
It is astonishing to see how far we've come. And yet I am surrounded by tremendous degradation, pain and suffering. Areas like downtown Port-au-Prince and Leogane (the epicenter of the quake) are still complete disaster zones, awash in rubble. In many ways, they look no different than they did nine weeks ago.
So many people ask me about all the money that's been raised in the U.S. and other countries for Haiti relief - is it getting to those who need it most? The answer is resoundingly yes - but millions were affected by the earthquake, in a place already buckled under by poverty and disease. They need health care, shelter, food, clean water. It will require herculean efforts, over the long-term.
We knew when we first arrived here on Jan. 13 that we would need to stay for the long haul, doing the training of local health workers that is the hallmark of our work around the world and that will help Haitians rebuild and take care of themselves.
We have a responsibility to those ghosts - that we learn from what happened in those early days and move forward, caring for those they left behind and helping Haitians to carry on.
March 24
A Plea for Haiti
By Sienna Miller, Global Ambassador, International Medical Corps
Global Ambassador Sienna Miller talking with Francois, who broke both legs during the earthquake. His home was destroyed and he's been living at International Medical Corps' clinic ever since. Photo courtesy of International Medical Corps
I came to Haiti as an ambassador for the International Medical Corps, an organization that I have been working with for over a year. Their teams arrived 22 hours after the devastating earthquake of Jan. 12 and have been a powerful and leading medical presence ever since. I arrived in the Dominican Republic from London on the night of March 18, and met up with my friends Margaret Aguirre from International Medical Corps, and David Serota, a talented filmmaker who has come to document the long-term health care needs that lie ahead for Haiti.
We flew the following morning to Port-au-Prince and were met in the chaos by Andy Gleadle, our operations director, (the kind of 'man mountain' that you hope to be around in disaster zones like this one) and were briefed on the security issues we potentially faced. For starters, the local jail was destroyed in the quake, and as a result, 5,000 prisoners are free and roaming the streets. There were serious security problems in Haiti before the earthquake, but of course everything has now intensified. Three NGO workers were kidnapped the previous week, so Andy told us what to expect and how we would be protected (a two-car convoy at all times, watchmen by the tents etc). Afterward we drove to the guesthouse to meet the team, drop our bags and then head out to start the day.
Our first stop was St Louis, a neighborhood in Port-au-Prince, to visit Dr. Joseline Marhone. I sat with her in the shade of a tree, her patients surrounding us on beds in tents nearby, and asked her to share her experiences with us. Her house was destroyed in the quake, but thankfully she and her son were in the basement at the time and survived. Her two cousins upstairs did not survive. I found it so difficult to ask the questions that I suspected would be hard for her to answer. Journalism of this sort does not come naturally to me, but she explained that it helped her to talk about it. So she speaks, with a resilience and strength far superior to mine upon hearing her. She was the director of nutrition for the Ministry of Health in Haiti. The nursing school where she taught collapsed, killing every one of her students. She told us that she had found that the best thing for her to deal with her enormous pain was to keep busy and carry on doing what she does so well. To date, on the grounds of the ruined church where she once worshipped, she has treated more than 4,000 people. International Medical Corps has provided her with the medical supplies and volunteers that she needs in order to do this. She is so beautiful and open, walking around with a smile that melts, wearing the same long blue cotton skirt that she was wearing on Jan. 12 when the earthquake struck.
My role here as ambassador is simple: we need to raise awareness of the road ahead for Haiti - and raise a significant amount of new funding through appeals to the public. Most people just don't realize that the problems Haiti faces are really only beginning. This country was in desperate need before the earthquake hit. The problems they are now facing are tenfold. The onset of the rainy season, which is imminent, means that the temporary camps that are housing hundreds of thousands of people will be washed away. Water-borne diseases will be rife, nutritional needs will become even more prevalent and there is inevitably a massive increase in sexual and gender-based violence within the camps. Donors have been incredibly generous, but as always, much, much more is needed.
After a fitful night's sleep in a tent with Marge, (gunshots, roosters, crying babies, the works) we have a cup of coffee and set off at the crack of dawn to visit some of the mobile clinics and projects set up in those early days after the earthquake by the stunningly beautiful and clever Dina Prior, who heads International Medical Corps' Emergency Response Team. We drove to Petit Goave, three hours outside of Port-au-Prince. The coastal regions are far more difficult to access, and it takes an hour by boat to reach the small beach community of Platon. It looks like heaven to me. The kind of untouched postcard paradise we westerners are constantly searching for. White sand so fine it feels like flour, azure blue sea and old handmade fishing nets thrown haphazardly over the ancient palm trees. We are greeted with smiles and cheers by a beautiful group of men, women and children, so grateful for the work that is being done. However, they are hungry, incredibly poor, and virtually cut off from the essentials they need. Until International Medical Corps arrived here, they faced a two-hour journey just to receive any medical attention at all.
The following day, we went to the General Hospital in downtown Port-au-Prince, and spent the morning being shown around by Dr. Gabriel Novelo, who is overseeing operations for International Medical Corps, and Megan Coffee, an infectious diseases specialist who is handling the TB ward and patients with everything from HIV to typhoid. They were warm and generous, taking the time to explain to my untrained ears the many facets of their work. I was amazed to see that despite the sheer number of patients - sometimes 800 a day - they are on first-name terms with almost all of them.
Our last stop was at the intensive care unit tent. Everywhere I looked, there were doctors and nurses from around the globe. They all work incredibly long hours, as volunteers, helping the relief effort out of the goodness of their own hearts. I saw a woman die two meters from where I was standing. A team of doctors then spent ten minutes doing intense revival work, giving her CPR, adrenaline shots to the heart and defibrillation, basically demonstrating the relentless commitment that goes toward saving a life. I stood and watched, hoping and praying for a miracle, as her pulse was checked again and again without a murmur. Every ER doctor has experienced this hundreds of times, but I am a woman, in a tent in Haiti, watching something I never thought I would witness. They fought and fought, and miraculously, revived her. I saw a life lost and saved by the medical teams International Medical Corps has working here. I watched this woman fight for her life. I saw her husband crying, not only for himself, but for their two children, and marveled at the simple fact that these volunteer doctors have the ability to bring mothers like her back into the world.
Later that day we headed to Petionville, an enormous displacement camp, to visit a new facility we have within the compounds. These people, like most, are living in tents, except that this camp (or rather city) is in a giant basin-like valley. When the rains come, and they already have started, this and its 60,000 inhabitants could be washed away. Logistically moving that many people, with the imminent monsoon and hurricane season lingering like a time bomb, is a terrifying reality that they are all facing. We met up with my friend Sean Penn, who is doing incredible work here through his organization, the Jenkins-Penn Foundation. They are providing medical care and devoting their energies toward the protection of these vulnerable people. We discussed ways of collaborating and were taken on a tour of the camp by Sean and Pastor St. Cyr (who is holding daily services for those living here, a vital task for a devoutly religious population). There is an area where tents balance precariously on the edge of a ditch that drops 10 feet into what is now a dry riverbed. When the rains fell a week ago, that ditch became a raging river and two children very nearly lost their lives. International Medical Corps is bringing in floodlights to try and prevent disasters like these from becoming a reality.
The following morning, we headed back to the General Hospital, where I spent a few hours with two fabulous psychiatrists, Dr. Lynne Jones and Dr. Peter Hughes. Obviously there are massive psychological repercussions to a traumatic event like this, and previous mental illnesses have been exacerbated in many cases. They are treating patients in the general hospital suffering from a range of illnesses from psychosis to epilepsy. The care being given here is a vast contrast to what is happening at the old mental hospital next door that we later visited. It is beyond anything I could imagine. This being the poorest country in the western hemisphere, education is not at the standard that we are fortunate to have in the developed world. The treatment here is archaic, the conditions inhumane. The people I saw were obviously seriously unwell. Some were screaming, some blissfully happy, very few are clothed and during my visit, most stood in tiny rooms, naked and covered in excrement. They push their heads through sharp and rusting holes in the iron doors to have a look at us, screaming for help. A mental institution is an intimidating thing to see for someone with no experience in this area like myself, but this made "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" look like The Ritz. It was shocking and like everywhere in Haiti, desperately in need of funding.
The amazing thing is that this country has a spirit that very quickly gets under your skin. The people are friendly and welcoming, and everywhere I look, I witness examples of human courage beyond imagination. They are sticking together through what has been the most devastating earthquake in a hundred years and it is vital for the various NGO groups to do the same.
I suppose what I am attempting to do is use whatever means I have to generate some sort of attention for a country I feel utterly passionate about. I am not a writer, but one thing I have always somehow managed to do is garner press attention. I am now hoping to exploit that for a very good cause.
Please, if you can, donate now to International Medical Corps - an organization that is doing this incredible work, saving the lives and building a future for these beautiful people.
March 5
A Promise Made, a Promise Kept
By Crystal Wells
If I remember but one face of Haiti, it will be that of four year-old Ornesto, with his big eyes and a nose that crinkles when he laughs. He is small and delicate, with a frame more like a child half his age, and a warm, rambunctious personality.
Beyond his energy and spunk, Ornesto is a survivor. Buried alive in a rockslide, Ornesto was rescued, but at the cost of his left arm. His head is scabbed and wrapped in bandages and he lives in one of the pediatrics tents at University Hospital, where International Medical Corps has worked since Jan. 14.
I am not unique in my love for Ornesto. He's easily stolen the hearts of a hundred women who have walked through the pediatrics tents, but I am bound to share his remarkable story in order to fulfill a promise I made to his father before I left the country.
It is a wrenching tale.
Before the earthquake, Ornesto lived with others of his family in the mountains above a town called Leogane, west of Port-au-Prince. They are part of Haiti's rural poor. His father, 65, supported four children, including Ornesto, from the little money he made from farming and slaughtering livestock. He never learned to read or write - which I discovered only after he was asked to spell his name. He replied that he could not, so for lack of proficiency in French or Creole, I will spell his name as it was pronounced to my ear, Kesisan Claude.
Claude and Ornesto are rarely seen without each other. Where Ornesto is playing outside the pediatrics tent, Claude watches calmly and proudly in the shade. He sleeps on the floor beside his son's cot and makes sure the bandages are changed on time. "We have no tent or anywhere to go," Claude said from beneath the rim of his straw hat. "The earth crushed where we lived."
In the minutes before the earthquake, Ornesto and his cousin, 5, went down into a ravine near his house to use the toilet. They were in the ravine when the earthquake hit and were pinned by falling rocks. Claude thought his son was dead, but still dug for six hours with a dozen others before they found Ornesto with his dead cousin crushed on top of his left arm. His head was badly cut and his arm mangled, but he was alive.
Without a car to drive to the nearest hospital, Claude carried Ornesto to Carrefour on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, getting a ride when he could, before an American came and transferred them to the University Hospital. There Ornesto's left arm was amputated and there they have lived since Jan. 23. They are the only two members of their family living in Port-au-Prince. "His mother died," Claude said. "The other children have scattered and live in other houses with friends and family. We are the only ones here."
Claude worries about where they will go when Ornesto is discharged. He does not know how he will support his son after losing everything he had in the earthquake.
In sharing his tale, Claude exacted a promised: If I retold the story I must include that Ornesto, with his beautiful face and larger-than-life spirit, is up for adoption. Claude says he wants Ornesto to live a healthy life filled with opportunity and this is something that he is afraid that he cannot provide. Because of this, Claude hopes that someone will consider adopting Ornesto, even if that means giving up his son.
Please do not misunderstand me and think that I am advocating for Ornesto's adoption. I simply had to share his story to shed light on what parents all across Haiti are praying for and dreading at the same time. If anything, I believe the plight of these parents underscores a need not for more adoptions, but for livelihoods' programs that create new income-generating jobs so that Haitian parents, such as Claude, must never face such a heart-wrenching choice.
In all the promises I have broken and kept, this one had to be honored, even if I am one of a hundred women to do so.
Feb. 23
Not Another Concrete Graveyard
Sometimes the most memorable moments arrive wrapped in the mundane. For Luben, a frail man who seems older than his 47 years, it was watching an ant crawl across his kitchen table.
The image of that ant, clinging to the trembling table as the Jan 12th earthquake hit Haiti, was his last memory before the ceiling collapsed around him, pinning his body against the wall. For four days, Luben lay trapped on his side, cheek pressed against a wall, eyes closed for fear that he would die if he opened them. Then a man crawled through the wreckage of his home and dug him out.
Buried under the concrete slabs of his house, Luben dreamt that God gave him four pills - one for each day he was trapped - to sustain him until his rescue. "I pray everyday," he said.
Luben was taken to an outdoor clinic hastily set up near the crumbled remains of Church of St. Louis Roi de France near downtown Port-au-Prince, where he still is recovering. An extraordinary Haitian physician named Joseline Marhone has provided medical care there in a shaded courtyard since the day after the earthquake.
In normal times, Dr. Mahrone serves as the Director of the Coordination Unit of National Food and Nutrition in Haiti's Ministry of Health. But these are not normal times and with her home and office both destroyed, she decided to make the church grounds a place of healing. Here, amid the debris, she lives and works. The nearby church collapsed with the priest and nine others inside. International Medical Corps supports the St. Louis clinic with staffing and medicines, enabling Dr. Marhone and other Haitian doctors and nurses to see as many people as possible.
I came to St. Louis on a Sunday morning with one of our doctors to deliver supplies. Expecting chaos and suffering, instead I found rival. A crowd clapped and sang beneath the wood frame of a simple outdoor chapel. Blue balloons decorated a line of pews that spilled into the courtyard. The sick, some in chairs, some lying on mattresses, lined the side of the chapel like a bow, each one close enough to hear the sermon. Haiti was on its way back.
Luben's spot is just to the side of the pews. On days he's not well enough to sit through the service - like the day I met him - he follows along from his mattress beneath a tarp. His mother lives at St. Louis too. She never leaves his side. She lost her home and all her other children in the earthquake. She will not lose Luben.
When Luben was admitted, he was malnourished and dehydrated, but he is recovering day by day. "I still cannot sleep because I am in pain," he said. "But every day I feel better."
Luben is one of hundreds healing in the heaps of rubble and broken glass that could have been just another concrete graveyard in Port-au-Prince, but instead was dusted off and filled with hope, song, and unforgettable moments that undoubtedly show how far human compassion and strength can go, especially in the face of tragedy.
- Crystal Wells
Feb. 15, 2010
The Rainy Season Begins
The rain fell a few nights ago for the first time. It started off slowly, around five in the morning or so and then came down hard enough to wake me up. The first thought I had were the thousands of people living in tent cities beneath ragged bed sheets. Even a light rain could wipe out their small shelter and this one was just a small preview of what will inevitably come.
My translator arrived at my hotel about an hour later soaked. "This is nothing, boss," he said. "In Haiti, it rains dogs and donkeys."
Looking at the toppled buildings, mile-long food lines, and families crouched beneath nothing more than cloth and sticks, it is hard to imagine that Mother Nature will compound the already widespread suffering in the months ahead.
The rainy season in Haiti usually begins in April or May and hurricane season quickly follows between July and November. This mid-February rainfall could be the first hint of an early season, which would be a very unwelcome twist to the recovery efforts underway here.
I traveled out to Petit Goave, a coastal area of roughly 80,000 people 68 km west of Port-au-Prince, where our water and sanitation expert, John Akudago, is working to build latrines and clean water systems. Some of the first latrines will be in Beatrice, where approximately 2,500 people have resettled in some six camps that scatter the hillsides above the sea.
His first step: making sure that women are involved in the construction, from when the first shovel hits the dirt to the final product. "Women are integral to the success of water and sanitation systems," says Akudago. "In each community, I tell the men that the women have to be included for this to begin."
And included they were. In the camp that we visited in Beatrice, women stood alongside the men, digging the trenches for men's and women's latrines and received hygiene messages, like hand washing, to share with their community.
I spoke with one woman living in the camp who had eight children, ages eight to 20 years old. It did not rain like it had in Port-au-Prince, but she worries about when the rain will come. "But only God knows when," she said.
To collect water, she must travel about 30 minutes roundtrip to a spring and back, but it is not potable, so it must be treated. The community, she described, is so happy and thankful for the latrines, made possible by the work of Akudago with International Medical Corps.
Back near Port-au-Prince at a camp in Carrefour, where International Medical Corps is providing health care alongside the local organization Hope for Haiti, some families were rebuilding their makeshift tents that were wiped out by the early morning rain. One young couple was lining the perimeter of their tent with cement blocks with the hope that it will keep the runoff out when the next rain comes.
Another woman, who lives with her daughter and grandchildren in the camp, worried that the babies would fall sick during the rainy season because they will often be wet and cold. "We have no toiletries and it is also hard to stay clean," she continued, picking up her smallest grandchild from the muddy ground.
Akudago also dreads the rainy season for the hundreds of thousands of homeless. "Sanitation is a big problem, especially in Port-au-Prince, and when it rains, the human waste will spread," Akudago explains. "I fear that there will be an outbreak of disease when the rainy season starts."
The rain is inevitable, but its first appearance in Port-au-Prince in mid-February could mean that it is coming early, giving very little time for the homeless to find relief before their next drubbing from Mother Nature.
But is it?
Only God knows.
- Crystal Wells
Jan. 21, 2010
Sienna Miller Gives Voice to Haitians
Sienna Miller, global ambassador for International Medical Corps, makes a passionate call to action in a PSA to assist survivors of the 7.0 earthquake that struck Haiti last Tuesday.
"The need left by this earthquake is enormous," says Sienna Miller. "Thousands need medical services and time is of the essence. If the injured do not receive medical care quickly, treatable ailments like fractures and open wounds can become life-threatening. The more people who come together and offer their support, the more lives we will be able to save."
International Medical Corps was on the ground in Haiti providing emergency medical care just 23 hours after the earthquake struck. "They are working around the clock to save as many lives as possible," says Miller. "I hope this PSA will shed light on the incredible work they are doing in Haiti and encourage others to support it."
In Port-au-Prince, International Medical Corps is working at the Hopital de l'Universite d'Etat d'Haiti, a 700-bed hospital, as well as supporting small health clinics throughout the city. An International Medical Corps mobile medical unit is also in Leogane, the epicenter of Tuesday's earthquake, providing emergency medical care.
Funds raised through the PSA will directly support International Medical Corps' emergency response in Haiti and save lives by helping acquire what is desperately needed on the ground, including medicines, medical equipment, food, clean water, and other emergency relief items.
From the Rubble, a Five-Year-Old Survives
Jan. 19, 2010
Megine resting at the hospital after being rescued from the rubble. Photo by Margaret Aguirre
While in Haiti, I have seen hundreds dead, piled up on the sides of the streets or mass graves, often covered in a sheet as a modest form of respect. But in the death and rubble, I have witnessed remarkable stories of survival, one of which was a little five-year-old girl, Megine.
I met Megine at the General Hospital where our team has worked around the clock to save as many lives as we can. She was carried in by her father, her right hand hanging on by a thread.
She and her mother were in their home when the earthquake hit and did not get out in time before the building collapsed around them. Her mother, Marie, made it out from under the rubble and to the General Hospital, but they could not find Megine. "I was sick to my stomach the whole time," says Marie.
Two days went by before Megine was pulled from the rubble. Her uncle discovered her and managed to get her out alive.
"I was so happy to see my daughter alive," says Marie.
Marie and her husband brought Megine to the General Hospital. Sadly, her right hand needed to be amputated, but she made it through surgery, united with her parents, and alive to share her story.
The Hotel Turned Hospital
Jan. 13, 2010, late in the evening
Photo by Margaret Aguirre/International Medical Corps
We arrived in Port-au-Prince this afternoon. The airport is so full of people trying to evacuate that it is difficult to find transportation into the city.
We traveled about 35 minutes by car to a hotel called Villa Creole. It is complete devastation here. Most of the city does not have electricity. Crowds of people are standing in the streets, taking care not to get too close to shaky buildings. Many in the crowds are injured, and dead bodies are lined along the roadside. Injured people are sleeping next to people who are dead. The streets are littered with cables from downed power lines, as well as cars and buses that crashed or were abandoned when the earthquake and aftershocks hit.
The hotel here has been turned into a small makeshift hospital. About 90-100 people were standing in the hotel driveway, waiting for help. We instantly began conducting triage and treating patients alongside a Haitian doctor from Hope for Haiti.
Medical supplies - such as IVs, pain medicines, and bandages - are extremely limited. Most patients that we have seen so far are suffering from broken bones, fractures and ruptures. Some are in more critical condition, but there is no hospital we can refer them to. Our team will sleep outside tonight. Like everyone else, we are afraid to sleep inside a building. The aftershocks are still coming.
International Medical Corps in Haiti
International Medical Corps has sent an emergency response team and supplies to Haiti. The team is providing medical care outside the general hospital near the Presidential Palace where hundreds of people have congregated for help. Other members of the Emergency Response Team are conducting a rapid needs assessment and visiting hospitals around the city to explore their condition. Monetary donations will go toward bringing much-needed medical personnel, supplies and equipment to the earthquake-ravaged area. Text "Haiti" to 85944 to donate $10 to IMC's relief efforts.
Margaret Aguirre is director of global communications at the International Medical Corps.
I’d just like to say thank you to International Medical Corps and Margaret Aguirre for all their life saving work. I texted “haiti” to 85944 and gave my $10 and encourage others to do the same!
— Sarah Jones on 2010-01-17