Overview:
A Haitian physician displays on how gang violence remodeled day by day life in Haiti, forcing folks to stay with worry, restricted motion and shrinking pleasure — whereas the world hides behind the label of “resilience” used abusively as a cliché to outline Haitians.
By Marie Alexandra Michel
Haiti was by no means a straightforward place to stay. However for me, all the things modified in 2018 and escalated at gentle velocity.
Protests erupted, gasoline grew to become scarse and violence intensified. Folks slept at fuel stations simply to safe a couple of gallons. Lockdowns adopted, together with the longest one in 2019 — peyi lòk — which lasted practically 10 weeks. By the point I returned to Port-au-Prince in 2020 after a medical internship in Les Cayes, the principle metropolis of the South Division, the town I liked not existed.
Kidnappings had turn out to be routine. Worry dictated our schedules. Church companies, as soon as held at 6 a.m., had been pushed later. Funerals, viewings and marriages weren’t spared both. Afternoons ended early. By 7 p.m., everybody rushed dwelling. Being exterior after darkish meant panic — for you and for your loved ones, ready anxiously to your name.
This was our new regular: measuring security by the hour.
As a newly graduated physician ready to start obligatory social service — delayed by political instability, COVID-19 and administrative paralysis — I took non permanent work simply to remain afloat. I labored as an administrative assistant for the Affiliation of Volunteers for Democracy (AVD) on a mission aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Growth Objectives (SDGs). Each night got here with guilt. Every time I used to be nonetheless exterior after 7 p.m., I felt I had made a reckless selection. We advised ourselves that if one thing occurred, it might be our fault for staying out “too late.”
Later, after I was assigned to Belladère in Haiti’s Central Plateau Division, I felt one thing I had forgotten: the flexibility to breathe. I had the time of my life. Folks went out at night time. Eating places stuffed after 9 p.m. Music performed. There was laughter. There have been grottoes, rivers and waterfalls to take pleasure in freely on weekends throughout picnics. I lived once more.
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Dr. Marie Alexandra Michel prepares to die within the pure pool beneath a waterfall generally known as Nan Kafe in Lascahobas, Haiti’s Centre Division, on December 17, 2022. Photograph courtesy of Dr. Michel -
Dr. Marie Alexandra stands in entrance of a close-by grotto alongside River La Sève in Haiti’s Belladère on September 26, 2022. Courtesy of Dr. Michel -
L-R: Coworkers Dr. Victoria Sherned Joseph, Dr. Marie Alexandra Michel, and Dr. Annie Selan take pleasure in a bathe underneath the waterfall at Nan Kafe in Lascahobas, Haiti, on September 17, 2022. Photograph courtesy of Dr. Michel -
Partial view of River La Sève in Haiti’s Belladère as seen on September 26, 2022. Courtesy of Dr. Michel. -
A part of River La Sève, the place water flows to a dam used to energy Belladère’s hydroelectric system, as seen on September 26, 2022. Photograph courtesy of Dr. Michel
However even that refuge was non permanent. As gangs expanded their management, roads closed. Journey grew to become harmful or not possible. Armed teams stopped automobiles, kidnapped passengers and demanded ransoms. Haiti grew to become unrecognizable.
Motion — one thing most individuals take with no consideration — changed into a life-or-death resolution
Right now, main routes connecting Port-au-Prince to the South and the Artibonite are managed by gangs. Folks take perilous mountain roads, overcrowded boats or pay armed teams to go. Journey that when took a couple of hours now takes a whole day — or extra — at triple the price. Some by no means arrive.
For example, as Mirebalais within the Centre Division is taken over by gangs, touring from Port-au-Prince to Hinche, the division’s capital metropolis, is a nightmare. Beneath regular circumstances, the gap between Port-au-Prince and Hinche is lower than 75 miles and used to take lower than three hours. The very best fare folks normally paid was about $7–8. Nevertheless, as a result of gangs have lower off Nationwide Street 3, folks at the moment are pressured to go by way of two different departments to succeed in Hinche.
This implies touring a distance about thrice longer than the traditional route. They now spend about 10 hours on auxiliary roads and pay a $45–$ 46 fare.
To flee the gangs, vacationers are pressured to undergo Gonaïves, Ennery and Saint-Michel within the Artibonite, then Saint-Raphaël and Pignon within the Northeast— a really harmful dust observe— earlier than reaching Hinche.
Even on these roads, typically they get blocked. Because of this, folks spend extra time looking for a secure option to their vacation spot.
Jude Augustin, an area emergency doctor, recounted his difficulties throughout his journey from Hinche to Haiti’s capital. “Final month, I spent greater than 24 hours touring from Hinche to Port-au-Prince,” he advised me in December.
One other necessary junction is Nationwide Street 2, which connects Port-au-Prince to Les Cayes within the South—usually a three-hour drive. It’s now managed by gangs as much as Gressier, about 35 miles from downtown Port-au-Prince, limiting items and other people’s motion to and from the Nice South.
Till lately, residents had been pressured to take perilous options, such because the dust street that crosses mountains and cliffs from Kenscoff to Marigot, Cayes-Jacmel, and Jacmel within the Southeast earlier than reaching Les Cayes within the South. From Les Cayes, entry to the Grande-Anse Division is a 2-hour direct journey through Nationwide Street 7.
Authorities hope that a road rehabilitation project will ease access to southern Haiti while reducing the risks associated with the growing insecurity on gang-dominated roads.
Traveling through the Kenscoff cliffs — roughly 4,900 feet above Port-au-Prince — is not only costly in time, money and energy; it often carries a deadly human toll. On March 2, 2025, a doctor from my cohort was involved in a devastating public transportation accident along this route. He had fled the capital after armed gangs invaded his neighborhood the night before and avoided traveling by boat after hearing about a recent sinking. Traveling the road for the first time, the vehicle plunged off a cliff. During the journey, the narrow road and sheer cliffs terrified passengers.
He was severely injured and became the sole survivor among 15 passengers, including pregnant women, children and elderly people. He lost consciousness from a head injury and later woke up in the hospital to learn he was the only one who survived.
Like those victims, many escaped neighborhoods under attack only to be severely injured or die on these dangerous roads. And similar to my former classmate, others survived horrific crashes on unpaved mountain paths. Patients are dying not because their illnesses are untreatable, but because they cannot reach a hospital.
Today, even this perilous route offers little relief. Gangs have moved into Kenscoff, leaving people with fewer alternatives.
This is what daily life looks like now.
And still, the world calls us “resilient”
People wear life jackets not because they fear drowning, but because they fear bullets at sea. Families avoid traveling together so kidnappers won’t destroy everyone at once. Living a normal life — the beach, festivals, nightlife and socio-cultural events — has become a luxury.
Resilience has become a convenient shield — a word that allows leaders, institutions and the international community to look away. As if our ability to endure excuses the conditions forcing us to do so. Haitians are not resilient by choice. We are resilient because we have been abandoned.
We have survived dictatorship, natural disasters and political collapse. But survival should not be the highest expectation for a nation.
What Haitians need is not pity or praise, but action: accountability from our leaders, concrete security measures, protection for health workers and civilians, and international engagement that prioritizes people over politics.
We deserve a future where living does not feel like a final act of courage.