Haitians gather to receive food and water distributed by The Salvation Army. (Photo: Yves Montoban)

While the situation in Haiti continues to be very serious, The Salvation Army Relief Team is providing massive amounts of food, water and other relief materials to the people affected by the earthquake.

Our team received two shipments of food and water over Saturday and Sunday, totaling almost 630,000 meals, more than over 5,100 individual water bottles, and 1,300 gallon jugs of water.

Team members were also coordinating with the US Army 82^nd Airborne to arrange a food delivery of more than 174,000 meals to a particularly hard hit neighborhood in Port-au-Prince which has not received any major food distributions before now.

In the United States, massive community packaging events are being held around the country.  These volunteer services have been crucial in helping The Salvation Army to deliver well over 1.3 million meals already and will ensure that these life-saving deliveries continue until local systems can be restored.

Early estimates are that The Salvation Army will be required to supply over 1 million meals per week for at least the next six weeks in order to sustain displaced families until regular and sustainable UN deliveries of food can be put into place.

Meanwhile, as The Salvation Army carries out its role as lead agency in caring for some 20,000 displaced Haitians, our workers continued to hold meetings and forge partnerships in order to address the devastated Delmas 2 neighborhood. Critically important issues being addressed is water and sanitation, the provision of medium-term shelter, and regular and reliable deliveries of food.  On-going medical services and the timely restoration of education programs for displaced children are also priorities.

This weekend was also a transition time for the team as some members left Haiti and new team members arrived in their place.  International emergency personnel continue to provide support and assistance for our Haitian Salvation Army Officers and staff who have been working heroically and self-sacrificially ever since the earthquake.

Critical medical services continued this weekend as well as the arrival of a new team of doctors, nurses, and support staff replaced outgoing medical personnel.