Since the January 12 earthquake in Haiti, many in the funeral service community have been deeply concerned about the treatment of those who died; NFDA recently teamed with four other national funeral service associations to express concerns about the treatment of the dead.

NFDA recently received a report from a DMORT-FACT (Family Assistance Center Team) leader who is on the ground in Haiti. The conditions, logistics and bureaucracy all present immense challenges, but the small number of DMORT Team members who have been deployed are doing their best. Here are the highlights of the report we received:

• DMORT was geared up for a full-blown response – the type of response they have provided in other disaster situations – but are currently in a holding pattern and only able to operate in a limited capacity.
• DMORT was given permission to start morgue operations, and begin the process of confirming the identities of deceased American citizens, on February 2. They had to briefly cease operations when an air conditioner failed and three team members, including the lone pathologist, clad in Tyvek suits, fell ill from heat exhaustion; they had to be airlifted back to the United States. DMORT has since resumed efforts.
• The Department of State (DOS) is maintaining the list of American citizens reported missing. DMORT-FACT staff members are only allowed to reach out to families that DOS has verified as truly "missing"; thus far, that number is 40. DOS is processing reports of more than 4,000 missing American citizens.
• There are numerous multi-national bureaucratic challenges. For example, because the government of Haiti has a sovereign obligation to protect its own citizens, an unidentified body cannot be shipped to the U.S. for examination and identification unless DMORT is able to forensically prove they are not Haitian (all other nations with missing citizens in Haiti have the same obligations). DMORT cannot prove nationality unless the body is identified; therefore the remains of suspected American citizens must be kept in a refrigerated unit in Haiti until DOS makes ante-mortem data (i.e., dental and medical records, fingerprints, family DNA reference samples, etc.) available and team members can make forensically positive identifications.
• Team members are working long hours – often 12 hours – while devoting "off time" to other day-to-day DMORT business, as well as other personal tasks, such as laundry and meals.

While the challenges are great, the DMORT staff members in Haiti are learning many lessons they can apply to their state-level teams. They have refined numerous protocols for handling ante-mortem data submitted by families. Also, as this is the first out-of-country disaster DMORT has responded to, they are learning much about the challenges of responding to international disasters and refining protocols for future response efforts.