PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — In January 2010, Haiti was struck with a massive earthquake that killed over 200,000 people and displaced a million more. Ten months later on October 19, 2010, the Haitian Ministry of Public Health (MSPP) was notified of a sudden rash of patients presenting symptoms of watery diarrhea and severe dehydration. Soon after the pathogen is identified as Vibrio cholerae—a strain of cholera not native to Haiti. The next day, the first outbreak of cholera in Haiti in a century was officially announced.
Three years later, cholera has infected more than 685,000 Haitians and killed 8,400 more and is still a devastating problem that Haiti is having difficulty managing. The outbreak has been so serious it is now dubbed the worst outbreak of cholera in the world.
While the controversy surrounding the introduction of the virus has settled (most of the evidence suggest a confluence of events, but identify United Nations peacekeepers’ outhouse waste flowing into the Artibonite river as the most probable source,) the infections and deaths have not.
Cholera is a waterborne disease. In a country like Haiti where heavy rains are common but basic sanitation and water treatment is all but nonexistent for two thirds of the population, treating cholera is an uphill battle. A battle that is made more difficult by the fact that there was not a single facility anywhere dedicated to treating the disease.
Fortunately, last year Haitian nonprofit GHESKIO called upon Boston-based nonprofit MASS Design Group to build a permanent facility dedicated to treating cholera.
When MASS arrived in Haiti to assess the situation, it found a serious flaw underpinning efforts to treat cholera. Most of the treatment centers were operating out of makeshift tents designed to last only a few months. Worse, contaminated waste was being illegally dumped, often winding up right back in the water table.
There is an infrastructural problem in Port-au-Prince. Due to the lack of centralized city-wide waste management and water treatment, clinics subcontract their waste. During the handoff there is the potential for error and recontamination. Moreover, what subcontractors in a poverty stricken country do with waste is questionable if not outright dangerous and illegal.
In response, MASS designed a treatments center which could address the illness from multiple vectors. Naturally, the building is designed with treating cholera in mind. More importantly, it is designed to treat unsanitary water waste.
By ensuring 100% of the water remains on site, the facility is helping to break the cycle of contamination. This feat is accomplished using an ingenious filtration system.
Directly below the building is a system of passive purification where water spends five days being treated through a series of vertical chambers. During the filtration, anaerobic bacteria break down upwards of 90 percent of the hazardous waste, leaving safe, sanitary water. At the end of the process the water is treated with a dose of chlorine to ensure that no harmful pathogens are left.
Impressively, the water is then directed to a garden in the facility where mangoes and papaya grow.
The facility also uses several other smart touches, such as deep concrete sinks aimed at preventing splashing; the floors are made of terrazzo, which helps with mopping and bleaching; drains on the floor are used to help easily move water into the treatment facility below; a pavilion-style design ensures optimized cross-breeze such that everything dries more quickly; rainwater catches provide a steady source of uncontaminated water; and specialized (very large) fans are used to move air in larger cones at lower velocity, which means patients do not feel like they are being blasted with cold air.
MASS’s facility will complete construction sometime early this year. With all the brilliant designs and smart touches ensuring the eradication of cholera, the only question that remains is how good those mangoes and papayas will taste.
Sources: CDC, Archpaper, Wired- Lifesaving Designs, Wired- Mass CTC, PIH
Photo: Mina Chang