Haiti's cholera outbreak
Witness History
BBC
4.4 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 8 September 2020
⏱️ 10 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In October 2010, Haiti was hit by an outbreak of cholera, the first in recent history of the impoverished Caribbean nation. Nepalese peacekeepers belonging to the international MINUSTAH mission were blamed for introducing the deadly disease, but for many years the UN refused to accept any responsability. More than 10,000 Haitians have died from cholera, and thousands more were infected. The UN finally apologised to the Haitian people in December 2016. Mike Lanchin speaks to the French specialist in tropical medicine and infectious diseases, Dr Renaud Piarroux, whose investigation helped force the UN's hand.
Photo: Haitians wait for medical treatment for cholera, Oct 22 2010 (REUTERS/St-Felix Evens)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Choosing what to watch night after night the flicking through the endless |
| 0:06.8 | searching is a nightmare we want to help you on our brand new podcast off the |
| 0:11.8 | telly we share what we've been watching |
| 0:14.0 | Cladie Aide. |
| 0:16.0 | Load to games, loads of fun, loads of screaming. |
| 0:19.0 | Lovely. Off the telly with me Joanna Paige. |
| 0:21.0 | And me, Natalie Cassidy, so your evenings can be a little less |
| 0:24.9 | searching and a lot more auction listen on BBC sounds. Hello and welcome to the Witness History Podcast from the BBC World Service, |
| 0:39.4 | first-hand accounts of events that have shaped our world. I'm Mike Langein. Today we're going |
| 0:45.0 | back to 2010 and the devastating cholera outbreak in Haiti that left up to 10,000 people |
| 0:51.4 | dead. The source of the disease was traced to Nepalese United Nations |
| 0:55.8 | peacekeepers stationed in Haiti, but for many years the international organisation resisted taking |
| 1:02.1 | the blame. I've been speaking to a French |
| 1:04.8 | doctor who led an investigation into the deadly outbreak. The United Nations |
| 1:10.3 | deeply regret the loss of life and suffering caused by the cholera outbreak in Haiti. |
| 1:17.0 | UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon makes a long-awaited but guarded apology in December of 2016. |
| 1:25.0 | On behalf of the United Nations, I want to say very clearly, we apologize to the Haitian people. |
| 1:34.0 | For French epidemiologist Dr Renault Pieru, it was a bittersweet moment. |
| 1:39.0 | It was part of a victory because Ban Ki-moon finally made some apologies. Very cautious apologies, |
| 1:48.0 | but he made some apologies. And of course for the people in Haiti that's very important. |
| 1:55.7 | Very important but it didn't mask the fact that it had taken the international organization |
| 2:00.4 | years to accept its responsibility in the deadly cholera outbreak. |
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