Don’t Forget Haiti

Warning: I am about to get on my soapbox about Haiti. So if you were thinking about giving money to the relief effort but haven't quite gotten around to it, now is the time. Spare yourself the guilt. It's been a little over two months since a massive earthquake leveled much of Haiti. The natural disaster caused more than $7.5 billion in damage—120 percent of Haiti's GDP—and it is feared that the death toll could exceed 300,000. Though it's impossible to imagine more bad luck, even for Haiti, it is feared that the rainy season, which begins next month, could endanger the lives of an additional 200,000 homeless Haitians in the flattened capital, Port-au-Prince. A recent New York Times editorialurged aid organizations to move faster and better, describing the situation as dire: "In hundreds of crowded settlements around the country, like the ones sheltering more than 600,000 in Port-au-Prince, food, water, medical care and security remain spotty. Large swaths of the earthquake zone remain untouched by aid. They are choking in rubble, and trucks and volunteers have barely begun to scratch out safe places in the wreckage for people to live."

And then there's hurricane season, which starts June 1.

Even without the floods and the storms, Haiti's reconstruction is expected to cost more than $11 billion. At a U.N. conference this week, the United States and other donor nations committed substantial aid: $5 billion for the next 18 months and almost $10 billion more over the next five years. Charity Navigator, a well-respected guide to charitable organizations, has reported that Americans donated more than a half a billion dollars in the first two weeks of the crisis alone, and another half a billion in the two months afterward. They even remade "We Are the World." The federal government has also sent millions in infrastructure and medical aid. But there's more to be done, and Haiti has very little time to build safe harbor. 

Unfortunately, our news cycle has moved on to sexier stories such as the Texas textbook tempest or, of course, the health-care reform law. I know there's lots of competition for your eyeballs and attention spans are short, because that's what we in the media tell you every day. But don't let it distract you because I'm not just nagging for dollars. I also want all us news junkies to consistently keep a sliver of our focus on news coverage about Haiti. Our attention is the linchpin in the effort to fix Haiti.

As the attention of news editors moves elsewhere, we need to reward stories about the continuing efforts in Haiti with clicks, comments, and reposts. There is still coverage of Haiti out there, like MSNBC's package on the aftercare of Haitian amputees, and that coverage needs to be read—both so we understand what's still going on down there and so that we send a message that Haiti is still newsworthy. As with so many other disasters, private donations will dry up over time and attention will fade. We can't let that happen in Haiti. Their government simply doesn't have the funds to take over the relief effort the way the Chilean government did after their earthquake or as the U.S. did after Katrina. Or as Ken Berger, CEO of Charity Navigator put it, "Haiti was the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere before this happened. Even now, it is still a Herculean task to get a truck to an aid station. None of the normal government protocols are there. It is and will be a special case of tremendous suffering above and beyond the mean for a very long time."

Berger is also quick to add that "it's the media that brings these issues to the consciousness of the public." Where our eyeballs go, dollars go. And, unlike the crisis on Wall Street, not all the money has to come out of our pockets. Companies will write big checks to associate their brand with rebuilding Haiti. Celebrities will continue to fundraise even though it's no longer Oscar or Grammy season. Please don't be offended by my cynicism—fame addicts have been manipulating our attention for decades. It's time to return the favor. Let's make an effort to post interesting stories about this still-unfolding crisis (like this one from CNN to your Facebook page, or tweet them.) Digg them, Tumblr around—all those social-media things will work. We can push Haiti reconstruction right up to the top 10 in Google Analytics and Twitter Trends. Then no credible news agency will let us forget about Haiti.

Lest you think me motivated solely by the desire to get millions of clicks for myself, use any of the other links I've already mentioned or this one from The Bay State Banner. Besides, I got the idea from a whole other New York Times pieceabout a system that's been set up in Haiti. Quake victims can text 4636 for assistance or to help direct aid. And since much of Haiti's population has a cell phone, anyone who texts 4636 will also receive texts alerting them to aid stations nearby. Since its inception right after the earthquake, this system has become the most reliable way to send accurate information to large numbers of Haitians. This is the kind of ingenuity we should be devoting some Internet time to—not just voting for Crystal Bowersox on American Idol. Increased attention on Haiti also means increased transparency in the relief efforts, which means even more dollars get to even more people. There are a myriad of great relief programs out there helping Haiti to rebuild its future and we need to continue to support them. YeleHaiti is giving newly developed jobs to Haitians thus enabling people to rebuild not only their country, but also their own lives and their Yele-Ville project is a joint initiative with the Government of Haiti to create a sustainable settlement for people displaced by the earthquake. That's brilliant, right?