 "Photo: Courtesy of Matt Watters")
 "Photo: Google Maps")
When junior Matt Watters got news of the earthquake that struck Haiti last week, he knew immediately what he wanted to do: drop out of the university for a semester and fly to the tiny island nation where he spent five weeks as an emergency medical technician last summer.
But officials at St. Bonifice Haiti Foundation, the aid group Watters works with, told him he’s needed even more here in the United States.
“I talked to the head of the hospital and he said ‘We have enough personnel right now, but we don’t have enough money,’ ” Watters said. “They need serious fundraising help back here.”
And Watters is just the person to provide that help.
Since September, he, along with Students for Haiti, the registered student organization he founded, has raised $13,500 to build a new medical clinic in Haiti. The donations – all from students, faculty and parents at the university – put Watters halfway toward his goal of $25,000.
Now, Watters said, his focus is on getting immediate relief to the existing St. Boniface hospital in Fond des Blancs, about 40 miles southwest of the capital city Port-au-Prince and 30 miles from the epicenter the Jan. 12 earthquake.
Though some of the foundation’s smaller clinics have been destroyed, the main hospital survived the damage and doctors there are trying the best they can to treat people, Watters said.
“They don’t have the equipment and supplies to do what they need to do,” he said. “There are a lot of Haitian doctors and nurses, but without supplies, they can’t do much.
Since the earthquake, he’s been writing to past donors encouraging them to donate again and fielding phone calls from people interested in helping. When Spring Semester begins, he said, Students for Haiti will plan a fundraising event on campus specifically for earthquake relief.
“There’s a dire need right now,” he said.
Watters first traveled to Haiti at the age of 15, as part of an Eagle Scout project to deliver soccer balls and uniforms to the children there. While in the country, the poorest in the Western Hemisphere, he saw the need for better medical care.
Moved by what he saw, he returned to the United States and became certified as an EMT. He spent a few years saving up enough money to travel back to Haiti, and this summer, spent five weeks there working in the St. Boniface hospital.
While taking care of patients there, he witnessed a baby born with a lung defect. In the United States, the child would have been cured with an $80 bottle of medicine, he said, but in Haiti, the medicine doesn’t exist, and the tiny infant died
“Conditions in Haiti have gotten worse every year,” Watters said after he returned last year. “The hardship is unreal.”
When he returned to the university in September, he founded Students for Haiti, which has approximately 30 members.
The group set out with the goal of building a new medical clinic in Mouillage Fouquet, a poor fishing village on the country’s south coast. It held a series of fundraisers including a concert, a partnership with the Red Cross Club’s Top Model event, and a letter-writing campaign.
Now, the hardship in Haiti is exponentially worse. The 7.0-magnitude quake flattened Port-au-Prince, destroyed the country’s already-fragile infrastructure and left millions homeless and, according to some estimates, up to 200,000 dead.
“It has definitely impacted what we’re doing for the clinic,” Watters said. “A couple of the smaller clinics in the area split in half, so we might focus on trying to rebuild those before we build new ones. Everything is up in the air right now.”
Depending on the needs of St. Boniface, he may use some of the $13,500 already collected to help rebuild the clinics that were damaged. That might delay work on the Mouillage Fouquet clinic, which Watters had hoped would begin in May, but he said the recent tragedy will not distract him from his original goal.
“I will build that clinic,” he said.
Watters emphasized the immense need for the international community to help Haiti.
“They’re beyond the point where they can help themselves,” he said. “They need foreign aid.”
In a posting on the foundation’s Web site, Nannette Canniff, the president of St. Boniface, said the hospital’s greatest needs include medical supplies, water, food and diesel fuel. However, due to trouble getting deliveries of supplies, Canniff said the best way for people to help is to donate money.
Founded in 1983 by parishioners at a Catholic church in Massachusetts, St. Boniface operates several health and education programs in Haiti.
Watters said he was relieved to hear from many of the doctors and nurses at St. Boniface, who e-mailed him to confirm they are safe. But, he said, some of the people he befriended in Haiti remain missing.
Watters said he remains hopeful that, with international help, the people of Haiti will rebuild.
“The people are very resilient, they’re very strong, and they’re very resourceful,” he said.
How to help:
The most immediate need is money to help with the earthquake relief efforts. Send donations to: St. Boniface Haiti Foundation, 400 No. Main St., Randolph, MA 02368 or visit www.haitihealth.org.
To donate to Watters’ efforts to build a new health clinic, send donations to: Matt Watters, 91 East Main St. Apt. 401, Newark, DE 19711 or visit www.students4haiti.com.
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