PORT-AU-PRINC
E, Haiti — The orphanage that was the focus of a dramatic rescue of Haitian children after the Jan. 12 earthquake remains in crisis, with ailing youngsters — one of whom died — and a director who plans to leave soon for Florida.
Approximately 34 children were still at BRESMA — short for Les Brebis de Saint Michel de l’Attalaye — as of last week. Most of them are destined for adoptions in France, while 12 are stranded with no pending adoptions.
Jamie and Ali McMutrie, the sisters from Ben Avon who cared for the orphans at two of three homes BRESMA keeps in Haiti, have been struggling for weeks to bring the stranded children to the United States.
The McMutrie sisters last flew to Port-au-Prince on Jan. 30 to deliver supplies to the orphanage and to make a brief, unsuccessful bid to bring the stranded children with them on the flight back to Western Pennsylvania…
We must help Haiti’s children find their families or find safe, new homes.
Protecting and caring for children with no family is a great burden and a high calling. Tending to orphans in a place like Port-au-Prince, Haiti, which was dangerous before the Jan. 12 earthquake, poses even graver challenges.
The earthquake that crippled Haiti and decimated its capital also tragically collapsed much of the meager support these children had, and there now are more Haitian children without families than ever. This disaster has pushed the suffering of these children beyond the breaking point, and they cry out to the world for help…
What can be done?