It hurts my eyes; it hurts my heart. It just simply hurts: watching even a small portion of the television coverage of the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti.
Last night, for example, CBS’s 60 Minutes had, as its lead story, a description of the 82nd Airborne Division’s efforts to rescue, feed and protect the victims. Included in the piece was the work of some physicians, from Doctors Without Borders, who were amputating limbs with rusty, unsterilized hacksaws – the only “surgical instruments” they had available. We also saw video of some of the thousands of bodies that were being scooped up and put into dump trucks in order to be transported away for burial in mass graves.
The scope of this disaster is unimaginable. I can look and listen, but I cannot comprehend. We’ve seen the tragedies of the Indonesian Tsunami and Hurricane Katrina but, somehow, this feels like it’s in an entirely different universe of terrible.
I feel helpless, despairing, depressed. All I can do is send money. Which I did once. Then did again. I have given to Doctors Without Borders, but there are several organizations trying to help. There’s a list of them on the NBC website.