Haiti death toll 300,000
The death toll from last month’s devastating earthquake in Haiti could jump to 300,000 people, including the bodies buried under collapsed buildings in the capital, Haitian President Rene Preval said yesterday.
“You have seen the images you are familiar with the pictures. More than 200,000 bodies were collected on the streets without counting those that are still under the rubble,” Preval told a meeting of Latin American and Caribbean leaders in Mexico.
“We might reach 300,000 people,” he added.
That would make Haiti’s earthquake one of the most lethal natural disasters in modern history, more than the 200,000 people killed in the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004.
The cost of rebuilding the impoverished country after the 7.0-magnitude quake could be as high as $14bn (£9bn), according to the Inter-American Development Bank.