In Les Cayes, the situation comes to a head two days after the devastating earthquake on Saturday.

Everything is missing.

Drinking water, food and medication are insufficient to supply the population.

The city in southern Haiti is one of the hardest hit places.

Numerous houses did not withstand the violent tremor of magnitude 7.2 and collapsed.

Hardly any building in Les Cayes and the surrounding region is earthquake-proof; the damage caused by the short, violent quake is immense.

Around 10,000 houses were destroyed in the region, many of them completely.

The death toll was put at 1300 late on Sunday, but is likely to rise significantly as many more victims are suspected to be under the rubble.

Tjerk Brühwiller

Correspondent for Latin America based in São Paulo.

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"The situation is chaotic," reported the journalist Jordany Verdieu of the Haitian daily Le Nouvelliste on the phone from Les Cayes. “A lot of people are on the street looking for help. Most of them are afraid to return to their partially destroyed houses, for example to fetch food. Many have spent the last few nights outside because there is no shelter. ”Verdieu speaks of a feeling of powerlessness. People felt abandoned as the relief teams were reluctant to arrive. The population has started to clear the streets with their own hands and rescue people who have been buried in order to carry them to the hospital. "You help each other."

The region, still suffering from the aftermath of Hurricane Matthew five years ago, was unprepared for an earthquake of this magnitude.

Medical care is also completely overloaded.

Few doctors have to take care of thousands of injured people.

The medical material is insufficient, improvisation is made.

Queues with injured people have formed in front of the region's hospitals.

Patients sit on the floor in the corridors.

Not all can be treated.

Seriously injured people are flown out

People are waiting at Les Cayes airport, hoping to leave the region. Some seriously injured people were flown out in small private planes to be cared for in the capital, Port-au-Prince. Some doctors have come from the capital, and the aid organizations have also sent people, reports Verdieu, but that is not enough to get the situation under control.

The disaster in southern Haiti brings back bad memories of the devastating 2010 earthquake that struck the capital, killing more than 200,000 people. The conditions have improved since then, say aid agency observers, thanks in large part to international aid. But many of the problems that the country is struggling with have remained: The communication routes in the Caribbean state are poor, the state is inefficient and undermined by corruption, and gang violence has made life even more difficult for Haitians in recent years.

First aid measures are said to have been hampered by violent gangs who control important connecting routes in Haiti.

An official from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Haiti said that a week-long "ceasefire" had been negotiated with the gangs in order to open a humanitarian corridor.

Storm Grace is set to hit Haiti

The earthquake also hit Haiti in the midst of a serious economic and political crisis. After the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse in early July, the government is led by Prime Minister Ariel Henry, and there is currently no functioning parliament. The elections originally planned for September were postponed to November before the earthquake, as the security situation in the country does not permit an election. Henry promised on Sunday "a more appropriate answer than the one we gave in 2010". According to experts and many Haitians, however, his country does not have the means to give this answer. “So far there has been no answer,” says Verdieu.

International support has meanwhile started. Private and church aid organizations from all over the world have provided emergency aid. Various German aid organizations have also provided several hundred thousand euros in total to secure supplies to the disaster region. Support is also coming from the United States. The American Agency for International Development (USAID) has deployed a search and rescue team, and the American Coast Guard claims to be using helicopters to expedite humanitarian aid. The Pan American Health Organization has dispatched experts to coordinate medical support. UNICEF is helping to supply hospitals in the disaster region.The organization is also supposed to provide drinking water and sanitary facilities in the region.

Nevertheless, the region is already threatened with further hardship. Tropical Storm Grace was expected to arrive in Haiti on Monday, which, according to the American National Hurricane Center, could bring heavy rainfall and increase the risk of landslides and mudslides.