Haiti: disbelief at the coronavirus epidemic

Text by: Amélie Baron Follow

In Haiti, the number of coronavirus cases is increasing daily. Too few tests are carried out to have a precise idea of ​​the scale of the epidemic in the country but the statistics of the health authorities make it possible to confirm the acceleration of its spread. If there are more people suffering from fever and losing their sense of smell day after day, some Haitians still refuse to believe in the existence of the virus.

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From our correspondent in Haiti,

Whenever the Ministry of Health publishes an assessment of the epidemic on social networks, Haitians counter that these are just lies, figures they believe invented by the authorities to receive and divert more aid humanitarian.

Added to this distrust, the carers face the denial of certain people themselves contaminated, as testified anonymously this doctor of a hospital located in the department of the South: “  Someone who made his journeys of driver was tested positive and when he was told the results he said it was not him. Nobody is going to force him to put on the mask, to prevent it from coming out. So it is difficult, people who disbelieve and who become sick do not protect anyone and it becomes very dangerous as a situation. "

This danger is all the more heightened since it is impossible for a large majority of Haitians to quarantine themselves because they survive the informal economy from day to day.

Our selection on the coronavirus

• Listen to our Coronavirus Info column 

• Our  explanations  :
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→  Disparities and inequalities facing the coronavirus
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→  Remdesivir, antibodies and immunity
→  The race for the vaccine is in full swing
→  How to make a mask and use it well

• Our series  :
→ “  The response, country by country  ”
→ “  Nurses  ' words ”

• After Covid-19, towards a new world?

• See also the files of RFI Savoirs on the Covid-19:
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→  Science facing the Covid-19
→  The geopolitical consequences

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• Haiti
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