Haiti: 7,520 cholera deaths as of August 26

MSPP has posted another six days' worth of cholera statistics on its Documentation page, bringing us up to last Sunday, August 26. This is the most up-to-date report I can recall. But as usual, the numbers are problematic.

On August 20, the most recent day in the last batch, MSPP listed 7,519 cholera deaths in total. On August 21 the number dropped to 7,518 without explanation. On August 22, 1 new death was reported, bringing us back to 7,519. One more death on August 21 made it 7,520 cholera deaths since October 2010.

All told, MSPP counted 412 new cholera cases, most of them not serious enough to warrant hospitalization.

But for several of the daily reports, MSPP shows that up to seven departments had sent in no numbers at all. On the 26th, for example, no reports arrived for Nippes, Nord, Nord Est, Ouest, Sud, and Port-au-Prince itself. 

So these numbers are based on highly fragmentary data. That in turn raises questions about the effectiveness of MSPP's communication system, even after almost two years of dealing with cholera.