Haiti (MNN) – Open defecation in Haiti is a major problem. The country doesn’t have a sanitary sewer system and 72 percent of the people don’t have access to any form of a sanitary waste system. Without a designated area to answer nature’s call, people will even relieve themselves in the streets. And when they have time, Haitians bag their body’s waste and toss it anywhere to get rid of it.
Nature’s Dangerous Call
(Photo Courtesy Of For Haiti with Love via Facebook)
Enter into the fact most people in Haiti don’t have water in their homes; leaving no way to clean up after emptying themselves, the lack of sanitary bathroom options puts Haitians’ health at risk.
For Haiti With Love’s Eva DeHart shares;
“This affects majorly the overall hygiene of the country and is one of the reasons why cholera spread so fast once the UN introduced it because there’s just no organized systematic way [to] get rid of the human waste in Haiti.”
In 2010 Haiti faced a cholera outbreak which was unintendedly brought on by a U.N. peacekeeping camp. Thousands of people died from the outbreak that was spread through contaminated water.
Latrines for Hygiene
However, For Haiti With Love is addressing this issue through community latrines. A community latrine is just what it sounds like, a bathroom for everyone in the neighborhood. The advantage of using latrines in Haiti, though, is they don’t need running water.
For Haiti With Love’s first finished community latrine. (Photo Courtesy Of For Haiti With Love via Facebook)
“They’re being taught that if they sprinkle the wastes with lime, the lime will eat up the waste and the latrines will have to be cleaned out less frequently,” DeHart explains.
“But it’s a project that is really being very well received and probably makes the highest impact on the hygiene of a community as anything else that we could be doing.”
For Haiti With Love built one community latrine in Haiti earlier this year, with plans to build two more.
“It costs $3500 to do a single project in a community. And all they have to do is mark their checks or designate their PayPal to go to the outhouse or the latrine projects. We will combine all contributions and as soon as we hit $3500 we give the crew in Haiti the go to build another one,” DeHart shares.
How to Help
If you would, will you help For Haiti With Love reach its need to build these latrines? If so, click here to donate!
However, please also pray. Pray for the community latrine projects to continually be well received by Haitians. Ask God to raise the money needed to build these latrines and for Him to be glorified through these projects. And finally, pray for the people in Haiti to encounter the Gospel as they interact with For Haiti With Love during the latrine building process.
