The destruction caused by Hurricane Matthew has killed an estimated 1,000 people in Haiti, amidst fresh reports of cholera outbreaks in the country, as it ended 3 days of national mourning on Tuesday.
In the aftermath of the hurricane, the nation faces a public health crisis as cholera has become rampant due to displacement, the lack of clean water, food and shelter. Furthermore, many supplies, including medicine, have been slow to reach communities on the periphery. “Due to massive flooding and its impact on water and sanitation infrastructure, cholera cases are expected to surge after Hurricane Matthew and through the normal rainy season, until the start of 2017,” the Pan American Health Organisation said in a statement.
The disaster has brought to the forefront analysis surrounding foreign aid, amidst reports that aid trucks manned by international organisations have left many locals empty handed.
A recent piece by Mark Schuller, an associate professor at Northern Illinois University, affiliated with l’Université d’État d’Haïtit, outlines the issues with Haiti’s disaster narrative and the respective consequences. He examines how the framing of Haiti as a “state failure” normalizes foreign control over disaster response and excludes key trajectories from being addressed. For example, he argues economic policies imposed by the United States. and agencies such as the International Monetary Fund, has exacerbated poverty and underdevelopment in Haiti – deepening vulnerability to natural disaster (read more here).
His piece comes after the United Nations said it would provide “material assistance” to the victims of a cholera outbreak in Haiti, after admitting its role in the spread of the disease earlier this year.
Mr Schuller, along with other civil society actors emphasize the need to support grassroots organizations, while addressing and rethinking the root causes of disaster. International aid organisations had tended to display a “we foreigners know best … get out of the way mentality,” he told the Financial Times. 
The chairman of Digicel Maarten Boute, Haiti’s main mobile phone network provider, said aid efforts must bear this into account. “How to help Haiti: source relief aid locally, buy our exports abroad, visit our beaches, invest in Haiti and its people,” he tweeted.