The main hospital in Port-au-Prince’s largest shantytown was completely evacuated on Wednesday after violent gang clashes broke out at its gates, its director told AFP.
Jose Ulysse, founder and director of the Fontaine Hospital Center, denied reports that gang members had entered the facility and taken patients hostage.
“There was no hostage-taking. There was a gang war, but the war is around the hospital. We’ve had neighboring houses burnt down,” he said in a telephone interview.
“All the health staff took cover… and we had to call the police to come and help us evacuate all the people who couldn’t move on their own, among them women who had a Caesarean yesterday and couldn’t walk,” he added.
Many patients fled the scene on their own, he said, and around 70 adults and 40 children, including newborns, were evacuated by police or in ambulances.
The hospital is in Cite Soleil, the nation’s largest shantytown, and has been scene of armed clashes since Monday after the death of a suspected gang leader.
According to an AFP correspondent, officers from the Haitian National Police’s elite unit intervened on Wednesday to assist in the evacuations.
“We were able to get everyone to safety,” said Ulysse, who added that patients were transferred to a “private structure” without offering further details.
