Friends, family and supporters.
A great deal has happened since members of the Blue Sky Surgical Team visited the New Hope Hospital and Dr. Eugene Maklin and his team located in Cap Haitian in northern Haiti.
At the time, the region seemed far safer than crime ridden Port au Prince and though we had made the decision to return to the Double Harvest Clinic (in Port au Prince region) with a smaller team in November, we left with tremendous admiration for what Dr. Maklin was doing at New Hope, and the conviction to do what we could to help him as well.
While we all know a great deal has happened since April. The assassination of the president has left a highly unstable “government” in place, Covid has surged throughout the country with little or no access to vaccines, spotty testing and little ability to track and manage the illness, and now the devastation of an earthquake in the southwest corner of the country.
Blue Sky Surgery continues to explore how we can help while facing the stark reality that bringing teams into the country now is not feasible given our limited resources, and the extraordinary risks. Beyond that, our two strongest on the ground contacts for logistics and healthcare, Pierre Dilus and Peter Pierrot and currently not in the country for safety reasons.
We will soon be upgrading out methods of communication so we can provide all of you the opportunity to understand what is happening and how you can help Haiti through Blue Sky. We hope to help Dr. Maklin build a new access road (see the picture below of the current condition of the “road) to his hospital so patients can arrive safely, and support the work of Double Harvest in any way until we can return.
Please keep an eye out for more information as we update our website and our plans!
All the best,
Tony Coletta
