Reader note: This message contains graphic descriptions of violence. Please read with care.
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This is devastating: Escalating gang violence in Haiti is driving tens of thousands from their homes, and widespread insecurity is overwhelming humanitarian response efforts.
Despite these challenges, UNFPA has reached 12,688 people with lifesaving services.
But these services are facing an extreme funding gap. Every month without donor support, more than 50,000 women will have no access to vital sexual and reproductive health services and over 19,000 will be left without support to recover from violence, including rape and trafficking.
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As the emergency in Haiti continues to worsen, women and girls remain the most vulnerable. Incidents of violence, including rape, are far too common and even young girls and elderly women are not spared.
“Since the increase in gang attacks we have noticed a high rate of teenage pregnancy, particularly in certain accommodation sites,” one UNFPA doctor in Haiti shared with us.
In one tragic case, the mother of a 13-year-old girl called a UNFPA hotline after discovering her daughter had been repeatedly raped by an older man known to the family.
“The child was in bad shape. As the days passed, her health worsened. She was admitted to a private hospital, where doctors diagnosed a miscarriage that had severely affected her uterus.”
Without care from UNFPA, her condition would quickly have turned fatal.
Gifts from supporters like you are already fueling our humanitarian response efforts in Haiti and helped save the life of this girl and countless other survivors of violence. If you’re able, will you rush an emergency gift — that will be matched — today and deliver lifesaving care to women and girls in Haiti and in emergencies around the world?
Mariline was six months pregnant when she was displaced with her children by gang violence in Haiti’s capital Port-au-Prince.
A recent report from our teams on the ground begins to capture the scale of the crisis — but not the human toll of lives lost and futures denied.
We are doing everything we can to continue reaching women and girls with lifesaving care. So far, thanks to your past support, we have:
- Deployed mobile health clinics to meet women and girls wherever they are, including in areas cut off from care by gang violence
- Distributed UNFPA Dignity Kits and Mama Kits, which provide women, girls, and new mothers with essential personal care items like underwear, blankets, and menstrual products
- Set up a hotline so survivors of violence, like the mother of the girl who was raped, can report their cases and seek help
But as much as we are doing, the reality is that our response efforts are underfunded. Right now, we have just 12.5% of the necessary funds to meet the needs of women and girls in Haiti.
Will you make a lifesaving gift today and deliver sexual and reproductive healthcare in Haiti and emergencies around the world before it’s too late? Any gift you make will be doubled to provide double the desperately needed support.
Thank you for being there for women and girls, like the one above holding a UNFPA Dignity Kit. Your support is deeply appreciated.
— USA for UNFPA
