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PORT-AU-PRINCE, 7 July (RHC) — MSF suspended its services at Haiti’s Tabarre Hospital on Friday after about twenty people abducted a patient while he was still in the operating room.
The organization condemned the attack “in the strongest possible terms”, which once again shows the unprecedented level of violence currently raging in the Haitian capital, and announced the temporary suspension of all trauma and burn care activities at Tabarre Hospital.
MSF said in a statement that on the night of July 6, a man with gunshot wounds spontaneously showed up at the hospital and while he was in the operating room, two people showed up at the hospital pretending it was a vital emergency .
When the outer gate was opened, about twenty armed people in balaclavas rushed in looking for the unstabilized wounded man, whom they took away, the authority said.
“There is such disregard for human life and such violence in Port-au-Prince that even the weak, sick and injured are not spared. How are we, as health workers, supposed to continue to provide help in this environment?
They added that they decided to suspend the activities to study the conditions for a possible resumption.
MSF had to temporarily close Drouillard Hospital in April 2022, permanently closed the doors of its Martissant Emergency Center in June 2021, and stopped supporting the Raoul Pierre Louis de Carrefour Hospital in January 2023 for security reasons.
In view of the increasingly serious situation, he called on the various parties to the conflict to respect the medical structures so that they can continue to play their role.
Haiti’s security crisis deepened after the assassination of President Jovenel Moise two years ago, and gangs currently control more than 80 percent of the capital. (Spring: Latin Press).