Haiti: The country has become a far more dangerous place to live or seek medical care
MSF urges policymakers to extend protected status for Haitians in the U.S.
As the U.S. Supreme Court prepares to hear a case affecting the legal status of many Haitians in the U.S., Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) warns humanitarian conditions in Haiti have deteriorated severely in recent years, cutting off access to medical care and endangering anyone forced to return.
“Haiti has become a far more dangerous place to live, work or seek medical care,” says Tirana Hassan, MSF USA chief executive officer. “Over the last eight years, Port-au-Prince and other regions including the Artibonite and Centre departments have fallen into severe humanitarian crises, with extreme insecurity and a steep decline in essential services including water, sanitation and medical care. Armed groups are continually battling the government and its supporters for territorial control. Residents are subjected to violence on all sides – caught in the crossfire, killed at checkpoints or attacked in their homes.”
“It would only compound the crisis to return Haitian TPS holders from the U.S. against their will, putting them in harm’s way. We urge U.S. policymakers to recognize this reality.”
Tirana Hassan, MSF USA chief executive officer
More than 350,000 Haitians currently live in the U.S. under Temporary Protected Status (TPS), a humanitarian program that allows people from designated countries to live and work in the U.S. Haitians were made eligible for TPS due to a series of severe crises and instability in the country in recent years. The Trump administration is now reviewing and terminating protections for people from several countries experiencing ongoing humanitarian crises. The administration officially ended TPS designation for Haiti in February, but lower courts temporarily blocked this termination. A bipartisan group of lawmakers in the House of Representatives has also voted to extend TPS for three years. The bill has not yet advanced in the Senate.
Violence in residential neighbourhoods is cutting off access to care
Now, in a case scheduled to go before the U.S. Supreme Court on April 29, Trump v. Miot, the administration is expected to defend its efforts to end TPS, based in part on its arguments that conditions in Haiti are safe enough for people to return.
Nothing could be further from the reality that MSF teams witness in Haiti every day.
Since violence escalated in early 2024, more than 60 per cent of medical facilities in Port-au-Prince have been closed or are only partly functioning. Some have been looted, burned and abandoned, while others face critical shortages of supplies, medicines or staff. Many people are too afraid to seek healthcare, even if they have a critical need.
In the past week alone, extremely violent fighting has broken out between several rival armed groups in two neighbourhoods of Port-au-Prince, forcing hundreds of families to flee their homes in the middle of the night in torrential rain.
“Over the weekend of April 18 and 19, members of our staff called us to say they were trapped in their homes due to the gunfire and had no way to escape,” says Davina Hayles, MSF country director in Haiti. “Nearly 40 people, including MSF staff members accompanied by their families, came to seek refuge in our hospital in Cité Soleil, having nowhere else safe to go.”
Health and sanitation needs are rising
According to UN estimates, more than 1.4 million people in Haiti are internally displaced by the violence, having fled their homes to other parts of the country. Many people are sheltering in areas without adequate medical care or other essential services, including makeshift camps and in public buildings like schools, where several families often share a single room. Our mobile clinic teams have seen an increase in patients with conditions linked to the lack of clean water.
On busy days, hundreds of patients line up outside MSF’s Cité Soleil hospital in the morning, seeking everything from emergency care to follow-up appointments for chronic conditions. The sound of gunshots has become routine in the neighbourhoods where MSF operates, even as our staff respond to overwhelming needs.
Medical workers in what remains of Haiti’s struggling public health system could tell a similar story. Only one public hospital in Port-au-Prince can still perform surgeries and it is routinely overloaded.
“People are risking their lives simply to reach a medical facility – sometimes while in labour or after being wounded or surviving sexual violence,” says Hassan. “This is an intolerable situation for people in Haiti and it would only compound the crisis to return Haitian TPS holders from the U.S. against their will, putting them in harm’s way. We urge U.S. policymakers to recognize this reality.”
MSF has worked in Haiti for 35 years. Last year, our teams provided 129,458 medical consultations, including 12,984 for children under five; assisted 2,812 deliveries; performed 8,469 surgeries; provided care to 4,975 survivors of sexual violence; provided treatment to 3,650 people for injuries from violence and conducted 19,819 physiotherapy sessions.
