Caritas launches appeal to fund relief in flood-stricken Haiti

Published: 2004-09-23

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Caritas Internationalis has launched a major appeal to fund relief efforts in flood-stricken Haiti. Caritas is seeking $900,000 in funding and donations to provide supplies to tens of thousands of people left homeless by a string of powerful tropical storms. Mudslides triggered by heavy flooding killed more than 1,000 people and injured 100,000 more in Haiti after Tropical Storm Jeanne hit the island in mid-September, according to the Caritas written appeal released Sept. 23. "The hardest-hit region is the city of Gonaives and the surrounding area. ... The damage was catastrophic for residents, all of whose homes and buildings were flooded, some beyond repair," it said. The U.N. World Food Program estimated some 175,000 people in Haiti have been left without food, water and electricity. Caritas said the emergency funding would supply kitchen utensils, sleeping bags, tents, medicine, chlorine and clean drinking water to 2,000 families in three different parts of Haiti.

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