Prior to the peacekeepers' arrival, Haiti had not reported a single case of cholera for more than 50 years. "Ever since the cholera outbreak, we have had people coming to us asking us what to do," Concannon told IPS. "We originally thought the U.N. would take on responsibility as we didn't originally see this as a legal case at first.
But we could no longer dismiss the people after no action was taken."
Vibrio cholera
Cholera, a waterborne illness that causes diarrhoea and vomiting, is a result of an infection with a pathogenic strain of the Vibrio cholerae bacteria. If it is not treated immediately, cholera can kill adults and children in a matter of hours. According to the World Health Organisation, up to 80 percent of cases can be treated successfully with oral rehydration salts. The virus, which is endemic in Nepal, reportedly had a surge of cases in the Kathmandu Valley in August and September 2010. With peacekeeping troops from Nepal deployed to Haiti every six months, a new contingent arrived at the Mirebalais camp on Oct. 9, 12 and 16, 2010. These troops had spent three months training in the Kathmandu Valley. According to the petition, Nepalese soldiers deployed as part of the MINUSTAH mission in Haiti were not tested for cholera prior to entering Haiti.
Ira Kurzban, an attorney at Kurzban, Kurzban, Weinger, Tetzeil & Pratt P.A. in Florida who is involved with the petition, said at a press conference at the U.N. Tuesday that a number of cholera carriers do not exhibit active symptoms which left room for error, as the U.N. only conducted tests on individuals who showed active symptoms. According to the New York Times, the Cuban mission in Haiti has asked the U.S. to help finance a 30-million-dollar major hospital for specialists as part of a broader effort to remake the health system. Since the outbreak of cholera, the Cuban mission has treated more than 76,000 cases of the disease, with just 272 fatalities.
The chief of the Cuban medical mission, Dr. Lorenzo Somarriba, said they send people to the homes of the victims to educate them on the disease and provide them with tabs to clean the water - purification tablets that have been critical in a country where treated water is rare. In a statement released by the spokesman for the U.S. Embassy, Jon Piechowski, he said while recovery in Haiti was a broad international effort, particularly to advance the health sector support to Haiti, they had not entered into any agreements with the Cubans. Compensation Concannon spoke of a victim who was one of the first to die from cholera on Oct. 22, 2010. The petitioner had been working in a rice field and drank from the canal that irrigates the field. Afterwards, he alerted his family about a boiling water sensation in his stomach and began to vomit before spending the night at home in excruciating pain.
The next morning he went to hospital, and in the afternoon he died. He left his wife and 12 children behind. The petitioners, who hail from Mirebalais, St. Marc, Hinche and Port- au-Prince regions of Haiti, make up more than 5,000 individuals filing a claim including victims, parents of children and relatives of victims who have died.
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/11/09-3