Quickly Answered Prayers: The Problem and The Solution

Yesterday the UK Telegraph (but not the US media) reported that due to policital indicision over who would pay for the care of the refugees - the US or the State of Florida - airlifts of critical patients were stopped. Today they were resumed; praise God! Here are the details.

Haiti earthquake: US stops military evacuations to American hospitals

Source: UK Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/centralamericaandthecaribbean/haiti/7121504/Haiti-earthquake-US-stops-military-evacuations-to-American-hospitals.html

Doctors tending seriously injured victims of the Haiti earthquake have warned they will die needlessly after a dispute over hospital bills and capacity halted medical flights to the US.

US military flights of patients to Florida, only two hours by air from Port-au-Prince, and other states have been suspended leaving hundreds in need of urgent surgery which cannot be performed with the facilities available in the Haitian capital.

Barth Green, a senior Miami surgeon working at Port-au-Prince's airport, said at least 100 of his most critically injured patients, many of them children, could die within days unless evacuated.

There were "hundreds of thousands of critically injured and severely disabled Haitians, and we're only trying to send a few hundred to America", he said.

"We have to resume these flights. Letting them die, that's not America."

However, US military officials said they had to suspend flights because American hospitals were increasingly unwilling to accept the patients, many suffering from head and spinal injuries, or severe burns.

The officials blamed the suspension on a dispute between the US federal government and Florida's state government over who should pay for the medical care.

Charlie Crist, Florida's governor and a possible future Republican presidential candidate, last week asked Kathleen Sebelius, the US health secretary, to activate the federal National Disaster Medical System, which pays for the treatment of disaster victims.

He warned that his financially troubled state's "health care system is quickly reaching saturation, especially in the area of high level trauma care".

A spokesman for the governor later said the state needed "a plan of action and reimbursement for the care we are providing".

President Barack Obama has promised Haiti America's "full support" and the US has despatched thousands of military personnel,donated £188 million in aid and evacuated a435 patients for medical treatment.

The perception that it cannot provide urgent medical assistance to a few hundred more desperate cases without bickering over money caused embarrassment at the weekend.

While admitting there was no solution in sight, the White House insisted the airlift suspension was due to "logistical issues" such as hospital capacity rather than funding, while Mr Crist's aides said they knew of no local hospitals which had refused to accept patients.

A spokesman for the Florida Division of Emergency Management said Mr Crist's request was prompted by problems of poor co-ordination and limited resources.

However, local health officials have made clear that cost - or at least reimbursement - remains a pressing issue for them.

Civilian flights from Haiti have not been stopped but doctors say military planes are much more effective as they are larger and better equipped.

The White House said federal officials were trying to expand hospital capacity so they can make more room for critically injured patients aboard the USNS Comfort hospital ship anchored off the coast of Haiti's capital.

The United Nations meanwhile began a major distribution of aid in the Haitian capital and aims to feed two million people. Under the scheme women will be given vouchers for rice to feed their families.

Nine Americans were arrested in Haiti at the weekend after trying to take 33 children out of the country. A Baptist group's bus carrying children aged between two months to 14 years was stopped at the border with the Dominican Republic where they were destined for an orphanage.

Haiti's government last week suspended international adoptions amid fears that parentless or lost children are more vulnerable than ever to child trafficking.
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Solution:
U.S. to Resume Airlift of Injured Haitians
Source: NYT
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/01/world/americas/01airlift.html?hp

WASHINGTON — The White House said Sunday that it would resume a United States military airlift of Haitians seriously injured in the Jan. 12 earthquake, reversing a five-day suspension that doctors worried would strand patients with devastating burns, head and spinal cord trauma, amputations and other wounds.

The flights were halted on Wednesday after Florida officials complained that their hospitals were overwhelmed and that they needed a plan for reimbursement for the care they were providing. Federal and state officials worked through the weekend to address concerns enough to restart the medical evacuations.

“Having received assurances that additional capacity exists both here and among our international partners, we determined that we can resume these critical flights,” said Tommy Vietor, a White House spokesman.

With an estimated 200,000 people in Haiti dead and a similar number injured, the halt to the evacuations quickly evolved into a roiling controversy distracting from the enormous efforts made by the United States to help. Aid groups complained that the suspension was putting lives at risk, while officials from Florida to Washington provided conflicting explanations and disclaimed responsibility for the decision.

Gov. Charlie Crist of Florida wrote to the Obama administration last week warning that “Florida’s health care system is quickly reaching saturation” and requesting that the National Disaster Medical System be activated to help with the cost. The military suspended the flights, saying that Florida hospitals had stopped accepting patients.

But Mr. Crist adamantly denied that and, as Florida newspapers dubbed it the “airlift scandal,” said he never wanted to stop taking the injured; he only wanted more help.

The White House, acutely aware of the lessons from Hurricane Katrina, stepped in to resolve the problem. Thomas E. Donilon, the president’s deputy national security adviser, led an effort all weekend to address the capacity issue; among other things, the government persuaded other Caribbean nations to help with urgent cases.

Mr. Vietor said the issue of who would pay for treating evacuated Haitians was not the reason for the suspension of the flights, only the concern about whether Florida hospitals could handle the additional patients.

“This wasn’t about cost,” he said. The matter of reimbursement raised by Florida officials is a separate concern, he added, saying, “we’re having ongoing conversations about that issue.”

Until their suspension, the flights had transported hundreds of gravely injured patients, all but a handful to Florida. David Halstead, an official with the Florida Division of Emergency Management, who is coordinating the state’s rescue effort for earthquake victims, said by telephone that Florida has treated 530 Haitian patients and that 190 remained in its hospitals.

“The rest of the states combined have accepted four patients, and it’s not that other states aren’t willing,” he said. “We can certainly accept patients, but there has to be a plan.”

In Port-au-Prince, doctors welcomed the news of resumed airlifts, which they called vital for some of their neediest patients.

“Keeping them in this environment, it’s like you’re sentencing them to a life of misery,” said Dr. Brian Crawford, a volunteer with the International Medical Corps, a relief and development group in Santa Monica, Calif.

He said he hoped that many states, not just Florida, would find a way to share the burden of Haiti’s broken bodies and minds.

He said he had one particular patient in mind: an 11-year-old girl who suffered a severe spinal fracture during the earthquake. She ended up a paraplegic, he said, and a few days ago Dr. Crawford transferred her from the General Hospital here to a charity hospital outside the city, which he hoped would lead to a flight out.

“This could be an open window for her,” he said, referring to the airlifts. “Hopefully it will be.”

The White House said patients were being identified for transfer and evaluated by doctors to ensure that they can handle the flights. In addition, the White House said that the government was arranging for in-flight care for children in need, and that Florida was designating which hospitals could receive the influx of patients. Mr. Vietor said the flights would probably evacuate “a couple hundred of the most severely injured patients.”

Ultimately, though, evacuations are not a long-term solution to the problem. Dr. Barth A. Green, co-founder of Project Medishare for Haiti, a nonprofit group that has been evacuating patients, said the American government has decided to create “a world-class trauma hospital” at the Port-au-Prince airport along with private relief groups. At the same time, a 250-bed hospital for post-operative care and rehabilitation will be completed, and after that a second 250-bed facility for rehabilitation.

“Things are the way they should be again,” he said. “We’re in sync. We are going to show Haiti what we are capable of.”

Confusion disrupted a smaller humanitarian effort involving Haitian children. A Baptist church in Idaho, whose members were among 10 people detained for trying to take 33 children out of Haiti, said Sunday that the team was “falsely arrested” and that the church was trying “to clear up the misunderstanding.”

A statement on the Web site of the church, Central Valley Baptist in Meridian, Idaho, said the team traveled to Haiti to rescue children from orphanages destroyed in the quake. The children, the statement said, were headed for an orphanage across the border in the Dominican Republic. Haitian officials detained the church members out of concern the children might be susceptible to trafficking and said some of the children might have parents.

Peter Baker reported from Washington and Joseph Berger from New York. Damien Cave and Shaila Dewan contributed reporting from Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
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Praise God for His faithfullness!