Visionary Fundraising for the Jackson Health Systems

 

 

Posted on Wed, Feb. 24, 2010

JACKSON MEMORIAL FOUNDATION

Let Haitian kids who need treatment enter our country

www.jmf.org

Bureaucratic indifference will kill Haitian children we once saved. Haitian children who need urgent medical care that is not available in their country are dying because they cannot leave.

The U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince has suspended the issuance of nonimmigrant visa operations. We are told by the federal government to ``fill out forms and in 130-plus days we will let you know.'' That attitude is a death sentence for many children.

IKF Wonderfund, a program of Jackson Memorial Foundation, provides children with lifesaving medical care at Jackson's Holtz Children's Hospital. We have identified dozens of children in Haiti who urgently need to be brought to the United States for treatment. These children face severe illnesses, and many are those whom we have previously treated here.

All of these children lost their passports in the earthquake. If they don't receive critical medical care, they will die.

IKF Wonderfund will pay for their care, and we have secured transportation to bring them to the United States. All we need is the immigration paperwork necessary for them to legally leave the country.

No one at the U.S. Embassy will talk to us. There are no clear guidelines for Haitians seeking visas. There is no one to offer information. The situation is grim, and if it is not addressed immediately we will have more needless deaths.

JANELLE MARIE PRIETO, director, IKF Wonderfund, Miami