IOM teams are targeting vulnerable communities throughout the
central Dominican-Haitian border area in the provinces of Elias
Piña and Dajabón to raise awareness about prevention
and response to cholera and provide urgently needed emergency
supplies.

Four teams of Spanish and Creole speaking IOM staff and
employees of the partner NGO Colectiva Mujer y Salud, trained by
the Dominican Ministry of Public Health in cholera prevention and
response tactics, mounted a prevention operation reaching from
Hondo Valle, Elias Piña to Restauración,
Dajabón.

IOM selected this mountainous section of the border for its
initial intervention due to its remoteness and the frequency of
cross-border movements of Haitian migrant agricultural
labourers.

Mobile and fixed information teams distributed materials in
Spanish and Creole to migrants, local residents and authorities at
official and unofficial markets and border crossing points, as well
as in schools, health centres, convenience stores, plazas, parks,
water points, and other community gathering locations.

Due to high levels of illiteracy in some areas, IOM staff
provided open-forum information sessions complete with
demonstrations on how to purify water and maintain basic sanitation
habits.  More than 6,500 direct beneficiaries were reached
with preventative information materials and the teams distributed
1,000 sets of oral rehydration salts and 100 water-purification
sachets in particularly vulnerable communities.

Migrants and local residents have told IOM and its partners
that, although information materials are useful, they are in dire
need of materials to purify water in order to avoid infection.

IOM has maintained a presence in Dajabón since the
cholera outbreak in Haiti to provide assistance to the Dominican
authorities at this important, and recently inflammatory, border
crossing point.

The Creole and Spanish speaking IOM Community Liaison Officer
stationed at the Dajabón border crossing maintains daily
communication with the authorities (including the Ministry of
Health, General Directorate of Migration, Border Patrol, and
Customs) and provides the authorities with simultaneous translation
and operational assistance in bi-national exchanges in order to
reduce tensions and mitigate conflicts that continue to arise in
the wake of the spreading epidemic.

IOM has recently received formal requests from the Ministry of
Health and the General Directorate of Migration to expand this
activity and to provide support for community interventions towards
the reduction of migration-related tensions and conflicts
throughout the Dominican territory.

To date the Dominican Republic has reported seven confirmed
cases of cholera and zero fatalities.  Based on IOM
observations, health posts on the Dominican side of the border are
well equipped and prepared, general awareness of cholera is on the
rise throughout the communities thanks to interventions from the
Dominican Ministry of Health, IOM, Colectiva Mujer y Salud, and
World Vision. 

Chlorine for water purification is readily available allowing
for a substantial increase in water quality at the numerous supply
points.  Haitian migrants from border areas continue to cross
into the Dominican Republic to buy basic items such as chlorine,
food, and clothing which are not readily available on the Haitian
side.

The IOM intervention is funded by the United States Department
of State, Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM).

For more information please contact:

Jean-Philippe Antolin

IOM Santo Domingo

Tel: + 829 340 8911

E-mail: "mailto:jantolin@iom.int">jantolin@iom.int

or

Zoe Stopak-Behr

IOM Santo Domingo

Tel: + 809 481 2671

E-mail: "mailto:zstopak-behr@iom.int">zstopak-behr@iom.int