FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 8, 2021
[Port-au-Prince] – The United States government, through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), has donated 50 brand-new, state-of-the-art oxygen concentrators to Haiti to assist in its fight against COVID-19. This donation is part of a broader effort to provide leading-edge oxygen equipment, technology, and assistance to reinforce the medical oxygen ecosystem in Haiti.
U.S. Embassy Chargé d’Affaires a.i. Nicole Theriot stated: “The U.S. donation of these 50 new oxygen concentrators to Haiti reaffirms our commitment to helping Haiti cope with the global COVID-19 pandemic. The United States government, through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), is providing $18 million to support the provision of medical oxygen to 11 countries, including Haiti, in the global fight against COVID-19.”
These concentrators will play a vital role in caring for critically ill COVID-19 patients requiring medical oxygen. Oxygen concentrators provide an economical source of oxygen in countries where the production of industrial medical oxygen cannot keep up with demand. An oxygen concentrator takes in the air we breathe and removes nitrogen from it, delivering a steady and unlimited supply of oxygen-enriched gas. Unlike medical oxygen tanks, these concentrators do not require any additional infrastructure or refilling, and they are easy to install and operate.
Beyond the COVID-19 pandemic, these oxygen concentrators will help Haitian doctors deliver life-saving intensive care to patients suffering from other life-threatening cardiac, pulmonary, and trauma-related illnesses. They represent a significant contribution in strengthening Haiti’s health system.
The 50 oxygen concentrators arrived in Haiti by plane on May 29 and are currently being prepared in the USAID Global Health Supply Chain warehouse to be dispatched to 16 select hospitals in the coming days. The facilities were chosen in collaboration with the National Coronavirus Response Coordination Unit (CNRC) at the Ministry of Public Health (MSPP) and include hospitals and health clinics in Port-au-Prince and in the Artibonite, Center, North, and South departments.
This donation builds on the $16.1 million the U.S. government committed to Haiti in response to the pandemic, through the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), U.S. Southern Command, and USAID. This funding has helped to strengthen clinical care, train health workers, build lab capacity, improve disease surveillance, disseminate health messages to reduce risks within Haitian communities, install handwashing stations, distribute soap in vulnerable neighborhoods, and more.
USAID Haiti Acting Mission Director Christine Djondo said, “USAID is proud to support Haiti’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic and has coordinated closely with the Government of Haiti and our partners in the health sector, including non-governmental organizations and faith-based groups, to promote the sustainability of this investment.”
For decades, the United States has been the world’s largest provider of bilateral assistance in health. Since 2009, U.S. taxpayers have generously funded more than $100 billion in health assistance and nearly $70 billion in humanitarian assistance around the world.
For more information about USAID’s COVID-19 response, please visit: https://www.usaid.gov/coronavirus
