PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – Angry crowds mobbed three food distribution sites in Haiti’s capital on Thursday, the latest handouts to turn chaotic as aid groups struggle to help the throngs left desperate and hungry by the catastrophic earthquake.

Several people fell and risked being trampled as a crowd rushed the grounds of the ruined Ministry of Culture, where Haitian police handed out bags of food from two trucks.

Also on Thursday, U.N. peacekeepers in Cite Soleil, one of Port-au-Prince’s worst slums, fired warning shots when a crowd turned angry as people waited for rice. Another food distribution turned unruly near the Haitian art museum.

Despite these incidents, not all handouts have been chaotic. Aid groups acknowledge huge logistical problems but say they are increasingly getting food to the hundreds of thousands needing help since the January 12 quake.

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – Angry crowds mobbed three food distribution sites in Haiti’s capital on Thursday, the latest handouts to turn chaotic as aid groups struggle to help the throngs left desperate and hungry by the catastrophic earthquake.

Several people fell and risked being trampled as a crowd rushed the grounds of the ruined Ministry of Culture, where Haitian police handed out bags of food from two trucks.

Also on Thursday, U.N. peacekeepers in Cite Soleil, one of Port-au-Prince’s worst slums, fired warning shots when a crowd turned angry as people waited for rice. Another food distribution turned unruly near the Haitian art museum.

Despite these incidents, not all handouts have been chaotic. Aid groups acknowledge huge logistical problems but say they are increasingly getting food to the hundreds of thousands needing help since the January 12 quake.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Jan 28 (Reuters) – Angry crowds mobbed three food distribution sites in Haiti’s capital on Thursday, the latest handouts to turn chaotic as aid groups struggle to help the throngs left desperate and hungry by the catastrophic earthquake. Several people fell and risked being trampled as a crowd rushed the grounds of the ruined Ministry of Culture, where Haitian police handed out bags of food from two trucks. Also on Thursday, U.N. peacekeepers in Cite Soleil, one of Port-au-Prince’s worst slums, fired warning shots when a crowd turned angry as people waited for rice. Another food distribution turned unruly near the Haitian art museum. Despite these incidents, not all handouts have been chaotic. Aid groups acknowledge huge logistical problems but say they are increasingly getting food to the hundreds of thousands needing help since the Jan. 12 quake. At the Ministry of Culture, Haitian police handed out bags containing such staples as oil, soap, pasta and rice. But there was not enough food for the tens of thousands of people who swarmed the site, and too few police officers to keep order. A group of men scaled the fence, jumped on the trucks and began throwing food bags to the people below, mainly to the stronger men and boys at the front of the crowd. Several people fell, but Reuters witnesses saw only minor injuries. A woman named Berline said the fray left her with nothing to feed her six children, aged 4 to 14. "I don’t have anything to give them. I tried but I was pushed out," she said, weeping. U.N. peacekeepers from China said they were there only to monitor the situation and did not have the authority to interfere without instructions from the Haitian police. STONES THROWN AT SOLDIERS In Cite Soleil, aid workers, guarded by armed Argentine U.N. peacekeepers, poured rice from bags into anything earthquake victims could carry it in, often just the front of a shirt turned up to form an improvised pocket. Some young men threw stones at U.N. soldiers. Aid workers are struggling with the logistics of providing adequate food for the nearly 1 million people left homeless by the earthquake, which killed some 200,000 people and devastated the coastal capital and surrounding towns in the Caribbean nation of 9 million. Malnutrition was a problem in Haiti even before the earthquake, and the need now is enormous. Many quake survivors say they still have not received any food aid, more than two weeks later. Aid officials acknowledge that, while water is being supplied to those who need it, food is a problem. "I think there is sufficient food," said Lewis Lucke, a retired U.S. ambassador serving as the American coordinator for relief and recovery in Haiti. "The issue there is distribution and security, and security is part of distribution." Separately on Thursday, U.S. troops, who have stepped up their visible presence in Haiti, accompanying food distributions and patrolling troubled areas, chased gang members who had gunned down a man in Cite Soleil. "We are here to help the population. If the bad guys try to attack them and we see that, we will protect the people because we are here to help them," said Staff Sergeant Anthony Sloan of the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division. (Additional reporting by Joseph Guyler Delva and Carlos Barria in Port-au-Prince; Writing by Patricia Zengerle: Editing by Jane Sutton and Eric Beech)

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Jan 28 (Reuters) – Angry crowds mobbed three food distribution sites in Haiti’s capital on Thursday, the latest handouts to turn chaotic as aid groups struggle to help the throngs left desperate and hungry by the catastrophic earthquake. Several people fell and risked being trampled as a crowd rushed the grounds of the ruined Ministry of Culture, where Haitian police handed out bags of food from two trucks. Also on Thursday, U.N. peacekeepers in Cite Soleil, one of Port-au-Prince’s worst slums, fired warning shots when a crowd turned angry as people waited for rice. Another food distribution turned unruly near the Haitian art museum. Despite these incidents, not all handouts have been chaotic. Aid groups acknowledge huge logistical problems but say they are increasingly getting food to the hundreds of thousands needing help since the Jan. 12 quake. At the Ministry of Culture, Haitian police handed out bags containing such staples as oil, soap, pasta and rice. But there was not enough food for the tens of thousands of people who swarmed the site, and too few police officers to keep order. A group of men scaled the fence, jumped on the trucks and began throwing food bags to the people below, mainly to the stronger men and boys at the front of the crowd. Several people fell, but Reuters witnesses saw only minor injuries. A woman named Berline said the fray left her with nothing to feed her six children, aged 4 to 14. "I don’t have anything to give them. I tried but I was pushed out," she said, weeping. U.N. peacekeepers from China said they were there only to monitor the situation and did not have the authority to interfere without instructions from the Haitian police. STONES THROWN AT SOLDIERS In Cite Soleil, aid workers, guarded by armed Argentine U.N. peacekeepers, poured rice from bags into anything earthquake victims could carry it in, often just the front of a shirt turned up to form an improvised pocket. Some young men threw stones at U.N. soldiers. Aid workers are struggling with the logistics of providing adequate food for the nearly 1 million people left homeless by the earthquake, which killed some 200,000 people and devastated the coastal capital and surrounding towns in the Caribbean nation of 9 million. Malnutrition was a problem in Haiti even before the earthquake, and the need now is enormous. Many quake survivors say they still have not received any food aid, more than two weeks later. Aid officials acknowledge that, while water is being supplied to those who need it, food is a problem. "I think there is sufficient food," said Lewis Lucke, a retired U.S. ambassador serving as the American coordinator for relief and recovery in Haiti. "The issue there is distribution and security, and security is part of distribution." Separately on Thursday, U.S. troops, who have stepped up their visible presence in Haiti, accompanying food distributions and patrolling troubled areas, chased gang members who had gunned down a man in Cite Soleil. "We are here to help the population. If the bad guys try to attack them and we see that, we will protect the people because we are here to help them," said Staff Sergeant Anthony Sloan of the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division. (Additional reporting by Joseph Guyler Delva and Carlos Barria in Port-au-Prince; Writing by Patricia Zengerle: Editing by Jane Sutton and Eric Beech)

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – Haiti appealed to foreign governments and charities on Wednesday to do more to help earthquake victims as rescuers pulled a teenage girl out of the rubble 15 days after her Port-au-Prince home collapsed around her.

The girl, named Darline and believed to be 16, was severely dehydrated and had a leg injury, French and Haitian rescuers said. “I don’t know how she happened to resist that long. It’s a miracle,” said rescue worker J.P. Malaganne.

The girl was one of more than 130 people rescued alive since the January 12 quake devastated Haiti’s coastal capital, killed as many as 200,000 and threw the country into chaos.

President Rene Preval said Haiti would indefinitely postpone February 28 parliamentary elections and he would not seek to stay in office after his term expires in February 2011.

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – International charities pouring a jumble of aid into Haiti must work better together to reach and help survivors of the catastrophic earthquake, President Rene Preval said on Wednesday.

Preval also said Haiti would indefinitely postpone February 28 parliamentary elections and that he would not seek to stay in office after his term expires in February 2011.

That means his government will have just over one year to rebuild the earthquake-ravaged nation before handing off the task to new leadership.

Aid groups and troops from around the world have struggled to distribute food, water and medical care to an estimated 3 million Haitians injured or left homeless in the magnitude-7.0 earthquake that wrecked much of Haiti’s capital on January 12, killing as many as 200,000 people.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Jan 27 (Reuters) – International charities pouring a jumble of aid into Haiti must work better together to reach and help survivors of the catastrophic earthquake, President Rene Preval said on Wednesday. Preval also said Haiti would indefinitely postpone Feb. 28 parliamentary elections and that he would not seek to stay in office after his term expires in February 2011. That means his government will have just over one year to rebuild the earthquake-ravaged nation before handing off the task to new leadership. [ID:nN27162845] Aid groups and troops from around the world have struggled to distribute food, water and medical care to an estimated 3 million Haitians injured or left homeless in the magnitude-7.0 earthquake that wrecked much of Haiti’s capital on Jan. 12, killing as many as 200,000 people. "I am not in a position to criticize anybody, not in the least people who have come here to help me," Preval said. "What I am staying is, what everybody is saying is, that we need a better coordination." Some food handouts have turned ugly, with U.N. peacekeepers using tear gas and warning shots to control jostling crowds. Other people living in ragtag encampments around Port-au-Prince have complained that no food has reached them. Preval said he was grateful for fund-raising efforts around the world and tried to ease concerns that government corruption might siphon off aid meant for desperate Haitians. "The Haitian government has not seen one cent of that money that has been raised for Haiti. I presume that that means the money is going to NGOs," he said, referring to non-governmental aid groups. Preval said a Puerto Rican group had presented him with a shipping receipt showing it donated $3.5 million of aid to feed Haitians. Preval said he asked, "Where is the food?" and was told it had already been given to aid groups. BEASTS OF PREY Doctors in chronically impoverished Haiti say the quake had created perhaps tens of thousands of new amputees whose limbs were crushed by collapsing buildings or removed to save their lives after gangrene infected their untreated wounds. With so many hospitals and clinics destroyed, there was little chance they would get the therapy they need, doctors said. "The future for people with both legs was already quite grim. What can be done for them?" said Dr. Lafontaine St. Louis, whose clinic made prosthetic limbs and provided physical therapy before the quake. The devastating earthquake also unleashed fears that child-eating spirits, mythological figures entrenched in Haitian culture, are prowling homeless camps in search of young prey. [ID:nN27182777] Nighttime patrols have been set up in some homeless camps to deter the ‘loup-garou,’ a spirit of Haitian folklore said to turn people into beasts to suck the blood of babies and young children. In one camp, residents described beating a man almost to death after he tried to take a baby during the night. In Washington, the International Monetary Fund approved an additional $102 million in funding for Haiti on Wednesday and said it would disburse $114 million to the government by the end of the week to help with rebuilding after the earthquake. The IMF also said 80 percent of Haiti’s textile capacity was capable of operating despite quake damage and textile exports were expected to resume as soon as seaport damage is repaired. Most textile facilities are outside Port-au-Prince. Preval bristled at suggestions that the influx of foreign troops threatened Haitian sovereignty."We are talking about people suffering and you are talking about ideology," he told a journalist who raised the issue at a news conference with Jose Miguel Insulza, secretary general for the Organization of American States. In a reference to the U.S.-led rebuilding of Europe after the Second World War, Insulza added, "Did the Europeans lose their sovereignty with the Marshall Plan?" (Additional reporting by Joseph Guyler Delva, Matthew Bigg and Jackie Frank in Haiti, Lesley Wroughton in Washington; Writing by Jane Sutton; Editing by Doina Chiacu)

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Jan 27 (Reuters) – International charities pouring a jumble of aid into Haiti must work better together to reach and help survivors of the catastrophic earthquake, President Rene Preval said on Wednesday. Preval also said Haiti would indefinitely postpone Feb. 28 parliamentary elections and that he would not seek to stay in office after his term expires in February 2011. That means his government will have just over one year to rebuild the earthquake-ravaged nation before handing off the task to new leadership. [ID:nN27162845] Aid groups and troops from around the world have struggled to distribute food, water and medical care to an estimated 3 million Haitians injured or left homeless in the magnitude-7.0 earthquake that wrecked much of Haiti’s capital on Jan. 12, killing as many as 200,000 people. "I am not in a position to criticize anybody, not in the least people who have come here to help me," Preval said. "What I am staying is, what everybody is saying is, that we need a better coordination." Some food handouts have turned ugly, with U.N. peacekeepers using tear gas and warning shots to control jostling crowds. Other people living in ragtag encampments around Port-au-Prince have complained that no food has reached them. Preval said he was grateful for fund-raising efforts around the world and tried to ease concerns that government corruption might siphon off aid meant for desperate Haitians. "The Haitian government has not seen one cent of that money that has been raised for Haiti. I presume that that means the money is going to NGOs," he said, referring to non-governmental aid groups. Preval said a Puerto Rican group had presented him with a shipping receipt showing it donated $3.5 million of aid to feed Haitians. Preval said he asked, "Where is the food?" and was told it had already been given to aid groups. BEASTS OF PREY Doctors in chronically impoverished Haiti say the quake had created perhaps tens of thousands of new amputees whose limbs were crushed by collapsing buildings or removed to save their lives after gangrene infected their untreated wounds. With so many hospitals and clinics destroyed, there was little chance they would get the therapy they need, doctors said. "The future for people with both legs was already quite grim. What can be done for them?" said Dr. Lafontaine St. Louis, whose clinic made prosthetic limbs and provided physical therapy before the quake. The devastating earthquake also unleashed fears that child-eating spirits, mythological figures entrenched in Haitian culture, are prowling homeless camps in search of young prey. [ID:nN27182777] Nighttime patrols have been set up in some homeless camps to deter the ‘loup-garou,’ a spirit of Haitian folklore said to turn people into beasts to suck the blood of babies and young children. In one camp, residents described beating a man almost to death after he tried to take a baby during the night. In Washington, the International Monetary Fund approved an additional $102 million in funding for Haiti on Wednesday and said it would disburse $114 million to the government by the end of the week to help with rebuilding after the earthquake. The IMF also said 80 percent of Haiti’s textile capacity was capable of operating despite quake damage and textile exports were expected to resume as soon as seaport damage is repaired. Most textile facilities are outside Port-au-Prince. Preval bristled at suggestions that the influx of foreign troops threatened Haitian sovereignty."We are talking about people suffering and you are talking about ideology," he told a journalist who raised the issue at a news conference with Jose Miguel Insulza, secretary general for the Organization of American States. In a reference to the U.S.-led rebuilding of Europe after the Second World War, Insulza added, "Did the Europeans lose their sovereignty with the Marshall Plan?" (Additional reporting by Joseph Guyler Delva, Matthew Bigg and Jackie Frank in Haiti, Lesley Wroughton in Washington; Writing by Jane Sutton; Editing by Doina Chiacu)

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – Doctors on the U.S. Navy’s hospital ship Comfort are fighting gangrenous infections in broken limbs as they try to save the lives, if not the arms and legs, of Haiti’s earthquake victims.

“Originally we were seeing primarily a lot of orthopedic injuries now we’re starting to see those injuries and wounds are infected,” Commander Mark Marino, head of nursing on the USNS Comfort, said on a tour of the ship as it was anchored off the coast of Port-au-Prince.

Asked how many of the 500 people treated so far on the ship have needed amputations, Marino replied simply “lots.”

The total number of amputees due to the earthquake could stretch into the tens of thousands, said Dr Ronald Waldman of the U.S. Agency for International Development.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Jan 27 (Reuters) – Doctors on the U.S. Navy’s hospital ship Comfort are fighting gangrenous infections in broken limbs as they try to save the lives, if not the arms and legs, of Haiti’s earthquake victims. "Originally we were seeing primarily a lot of orthopedic injuries now we’re starting to see those injuries and wounds are infected," Commander Mark Marino, head of nursing on the USNS Comfort, said on a tour of the ship as it was anchored off the coast of Port-au-Prince. Asked how many of the 500 people treated so far on the ship have needed amputations, Marino replied simply "lots." The total number of amputees due to the earthquake could stretch into the tens of thousands, said Dr Ronald Waldman of the U.S. Agency for International Development. Their care will burden the country’s medical system for decades. The magnitude 7.0 quake hit late afternoon on Jan. 12 and wounds left untreated that long frequently develop fatal infections unless the limb is taken off. Already in Port-au-Prince, one-legged people on crutches are a frequent sight, part of what a Haitian doctor said was a generation of amputees, many of them young, who will need expensive care that was unavailable to most even before the quake hit the Western Hemisphere’s poorest country. The Comfort’s doctors count as a miracle a young man badly infected with gangrene they thought surely would die. Taking off his arm and leg saved his life. "We can fix femur fractures," Marino said, if the patient arrives soon after the injury. Now, weeks after the quake, patients are sick with infection. "The majority of the amputations we have had to do have been either extremities that had gotten infected and they were no longer salvageable or they came in traumatically amputated and we were just treating the wound and closing it up," he said. Lieutenant Bashon Mann, public affairs officer for the ship, said the Comfort, and its 200 doctors and nurses, will be here as long as the Haitian government says it is needed. They were told to prepare for at least a six-month trip. Operating rooms on the 1,000-bed ship run around the clock to treat orthopedic injuries, head wounds and even one shark bite. But the 890-foot-long (271-metre) floating hospital is stretched to the limit. ‘WAR ON STEROIDS’ People on the ship who have served during wars, Marino said, "liken this to war on steroids because the volume is so great." The ship was designed to treat young soldiers and sailors with war wounds, not masses of civilians, many with amputated limbs or broken legs, who cannot safely climb to the ship’s 400 top bunks. The goal is to have a place to move about 100 recovering patients off the ship and into a hospital on land each day so more patients can be moved to the Comfort. So far, only 60 to 70 have been moved ashore. But Port-au-Prince hospitals are stretched beyond their limit as well. They have set up tent facilities on their grounds, due both to damaged buildings and Haitians’ fear of being inside if one of the many daily aftershocks is violent. One lucky patient on the Comfort, tiny Gabrielle Estalink, 12, was able to keep her leg despite a deep gash suffered when a mirror fell on her. Port-au-Prince was a challenging place to live before the quake, now to navigate its uneven, hilly and often unpaved streets on one leg will make life even more difficult. Dr Lafontaine St. Louis, whose clinic before the quake made prosthetic limbs and provided physical therapy, said ideally many amputees should already be getting treatment with electronic devices and therapy to keep their muscles strong. "The future for people with both legs was already quite grim. What can be done for them?" he asked in an interview on a Port-au-Prince street corner. He is trying to find a place to reopen his damaged clinic, but the costs, and the lack of skilled medical care in this field, are daunting impediments. St. Louis said he knew of only three other doctors in his specialty in Haiti, one of whom was 80 years old, and four to six physical therapists. The many children who have lost limbs will need a new prosthesis every two to three years as they grow, he said, as well as physical rehabilitation. One organization, Physicians for Peace, has started an international collection of used prosthetic devices. (Editing by Eric Beech)