Bringing it to 10,707.

Bloggers,

This came over the weekend, written by Dr. Dan Diamond, a physician with The Doctors Clinic in Silverdale. Rachel Pritchett

Blog from Haiti By Dr. Dan Diamond on behalf of Medical Teams International

It has been a long but intense day. We started out by going to the UN field hospital to tell them that we thought we had a workable solution for the lack of operating rooms. All we needed was to have an engineer certify the building as safe. At the UN they were excited but they sent us on a bit of a wild goose chase looking for an engineer.
Later we came back to the UN for the Health Care Cluster Meeting. It was a very disorganized and frustrating meeting but we met Chris from Partners in Heath (the organization that the book Mountains Beyond Mountains was written about). Guess what he was? An engineer!! He went after the meeting and certified our building as safe!
I stayed out at the UN while he was inspecting the hospital and met with Stephanie from PIH that was working with the WHO and UN to coordinate the relief work. She was fantastic and had a great understanding of acute disaster relief. She was friends and coworkers with Chris. I ended up staying the night at the UN field hospital where I took on the role of supervisor to give some much needed rest and time for real food to the supervisors. They have done a monumental job under severe conditions.

This evening I helped to amputate the foot of an 11 year old boy but he later died. His mother lost his sister in the quake as well. So sad. I helped to put him in a body bag and we put him in the refer trailer with the other bodies. The smell is horrific and overwhelming. The mother is so destitute that she later asked me to get the money she put under his pillow. It was about 20 Haitian dollars. She was numb and just sat there. Non-verbally I tried to communicate with her that I cared. Our eyes locked and I knew she knew that I cared and that we did all we could.
Without functioning operating rooms many of these people will be dead in a matter of days.
Tomorrow we are going to do what we can to get ours open and King’s Hospital. I’m also hoping to do a helicopter survey tomorrow with Stephanie and Bill and perhaps the woman from USAID. As busy and smelly as it is sitting here outside the UN hospital, I know I will never be able to comprehend the full scale of this disaster.
I’m grateful for the cool breeze this evening.
Dan

I have just returned from the Hightower home. Arrangements are being made now to bring the body home. The Hightower family will not be attending the 7 p.m. service at St. Louise Church, 141 156th Ave. NW, Bellevue tonight, Friday evening. They ask that memorials be sent to Friends of the Orphans, Northwest Region. Donations may be made online at www.friendsoftheorphans.org/quakehelp; or mailed to the same organization at 1800 112th Ave. NE, Suite 308-E, Bellevue, WA 98004. Rachel Pritchett, reporter

I have just received this statement from the group Molly was working for over in Haiti. Rachel Pritchett

CHICAGO — January 15, 2010, 10:30 a.m. CST—It is with deep anguish that Friends of the Orphans is confirming the deaths in Haiti of international volunteer Molly Hightower, 22, of Port Orchard, Wash., and Ryan Kloos, 24, of Phoenix, Ariz, who is the brother of Friends of the Orphans international volunteer Erin Kloos, 26, also of Phoenix.

Ryan Kloos, a 2008 graduate of the University of California-San Diego, was recovered from the Fr. Wasson Center in Petionville on the afternoon of January 13. Erin Kloos was rescued from the Fr. Wasson Center on January 13 and is currently in stable condition in a south Florida hospital’s intensive care unit. Her prognosis is good.

After an extensive search, Molly’s body was recovered from the same location at approximately 4:30 a.m. ET Friday, Jan. 15.

A friend of Molly’s visiting Haiti, 22-year-old Rachel Prusynski, a University of Portland graduate and resident of Boise, Idaho, was also rescued from the Fr. Wasson Center on January 13. After medical treatment for a broken arm and severe cuts, she has been reunited with her family in the U.S.

Both Erin, a University of Washington graduate, and Molly, who graduated from the University of Portland, worked as international volunteers for Friends of the Orphans. They served at Nuestros Pequeños Hermanos/Nos Petit Freres et Soeurs (NPH/NPFS, Spanish and French for “Our Little Brothers and Sisters”) in Haiti. Molly assisted in the physical therapy program, and had begun her service in June 2009.

Erin’s initial volunteer service spanned September 2007 to October 2008. She had recently returned to NPFS and served in many capacities. While at NPFS, she helped in the lab at the hospital, assisted with visitors and volunteers, and translated for visiting doctors.

Both volunteers spent their evenings and weekends caring for and playing with the children in the hospital and those with special needs.

The Fr. Wasson Center in Petionville served as a guest house, volunteer residence, administrative offices and a day school for children with disabilities, and completely collapsed during the 7.0 magnitude Haitian earthquake.

Friends of the Orphans extends our prayers and deepest condolences to the Hightower and Kloos families during this extremely difficult time.

Bloggers,

I just received this information from Sabina Hammond of Port Orchard. Her father- and mother-in-law are in Cyvadier, Haiti, about 15 miles from Port-au-Prince.
They run a medical clinic there under the auspices of Friends of the Children of Haiti. The clinic is receiving an influx of sick and injured from Port-au-Prince. Here is the dispatch from Sabina’s father-in-law, Richard Hammond:

We are OK.  The country is a disaster.  I spent a good part of the day in Jacmel conferring with the mayor and the UN about the situation and what can be done.  No one other than FOTCOH  has medication although I am sure some will be arriving soon.  We need disaster supplies for the people.  Our medical team is supposed to arrive on Monday in PAP but at this time we cannot even confirm that they will have a flight from PAP to Jacmel.  We are working to make things happen.  The mountain road between PAP and Jacmel is closed.  At least twenty areas of the road are blocked by landslides or large separations of pavement.  The only way across the mountain road is by motorcycle and at some spots they need to be carried over the openings in the road.
Please pray for the Haitian people.  They are walking around in a daze.  They cannot comprehend what has happened.  They are not returning to their homes because they fear that they will collapse..  Many people have been killed.  PAP is getting all of the news but there are problems everywhere.
Keep us all in your prayers.
God bless.
Dad  

I have the sad duty today of writing about what’s for the Hightower family of Port Orchard as far as arrangements, services and more for their daughter, Molly Hightower, who died in the Haiti earthquake.

I invite friends and family of Molly to call me with whatever you’d like to say.

Rachel Pritchett, reporter
(360) 475-3783

Bloggers,

Silverdale physician Dan Diamond is on his way to Haiti with a team from Medical Teams International. KOMO TV interviewed him at Sea-Tac this morning before he left, and is sharing that interview with the Kitsap Sun. Diamond works for The Doctors Clinic in Silverdale. It’s not at all sure he’ll be able to get into Port-au-Prince right away. Look for my story about Diamond, soon.

Rachel Pritchett, reporter
475-3783
rpritchett@kitsapsun.com

If you have a connection to the Haiti tragedy (persons there, help on the way, etc.) call me today, Thursday, at (360) 475-3783. Thank you.

Rachel Pritchett, reporter

Dow at 10,704, up 23 points this morning.

NEW YORK (AP) — The stock market traded in a tight range Thursday after the government said businesses increased inventories by a larger-than-expected amount in November.
The gain in inventories is a welcome sign for the economy and suggests that businesses are feeling more confident that sales will pick up. It was the second straight month that stockpiles increased after 13 months of declines.
The positive news on inventories helped to balance weaker reports on retail sales and initial unemployment claims. The Commerce Department said business inventories rose by 0.4 percent in November, double the increase economists expected. Earlier, it said retail sales fell 0.3 percent in December. Economists polled by Thomson Reuters had been expected an increase.
There was also positive news from SAP, a major business software maker based in Germany. SAP said its fourth-quarter revenue fell less than forecast, providing some reassurance that companies are becoming more willing to invest in technology. Investors are also watching closely to see if companies can bolster their earnings with solid revenues instead of just continuing to cut costs.
In less encouraging news, the Labor Department reported that workers seeking unemployment benefits for the first time rose by 11,000 last week, more than the 3,000 economists had expected. The jump was due partly to typical seasonal layoffs in the retail, manufacturing and construction industries.
Later Thursday, market participants will dissect an earnings report from chip maker Intel Corp. Investors see Intel’s earnings as a sign of business and consumer demand in the overall economy.
Investors are becoming accustomed to seeing jagged indicators on the economy and have generally not lost their cool on the occasional poor economic report. However analysts widely believe that there will need to be a meaningful pickup in job creation if a 10-month stock rally is to continue.
“The economy has already shown signs of improvement and in investors’ minds the question is how much of that is already priced into the market,” said Brian Lazorishak, portfolio manager at Chase Investment Council in Charlottesville, Va.
In early afternoon trading, the Dow Jones industrial average rose 14.58, or 0.1 percent, to 10,695.35. The broader Standard & Poor’s 500 index rose 0.30, or less than 0.1 percent, to 1,145.98, and the Nasdaq composite index rose 3.31, or 0.1 percent, to 2,311.21.
Demand for the safety of government debt increased. Treasury prices rose, pushing yields lower. The yield on the benchmark 10-year note fell to 3.76 percent from 3.80 percent late Wednesday.
Stocks rose Wednesday, led in part by financial stocks after the appearance by bank CEOs on Capitol Hill did not dissuade investors from jumping into the sector. The executives testified before Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, which is investigating the near collapse of the financial system and credit markets in the fall of 2008.
The panel will be meeting with regulators on the topic on Thursday.
SAP rose 70 cents to $51.09, while Intel rose 25 cents to $21.21.
The reports come after aluminum maker Alcoa Inc. on Monday posted quarterly results that fell short of expectations, leading to concerns that the recovery was not yet boosting corporate earnings.
The dollar was mixed again other major currencies. Gold fell modestly.
Crude oil fell 27 cents to $79.77 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Rising stocks narrowly outpaced those that declined on the New York Stock Exchange, where volume came to 302.6 million shares compared with 350.2 million shares traded at the same point Wednesday.
The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies rose 1.52, or 0.2 percent, to 645.08.
Overseas markets rallied as investors became more comfortable with China’s recent moves to tighten monetary policy. China is making the moves, such as forcing banks to hold more reserves, to discourage excess lending.
Britain’s FTSE 100 gained 0.5 percent, Germany’s DAX index rose 0.4 percent, and France’s CAC-40 rose 0.4 percent. Earlier, Japan’s Nikkei stock average rose 1.6 percent.

Rachel Pritchett, reporter, 475-3783