Bill Clinton Visits Haiti

Ex-president, Chelsea tour Port-au-Prince hospital
By Marie Morris,  Newser Staff
Posted Jan 18, 2010 7:54 PM CST
Bill Clinton Visits Haiti
Former President Bill Clinton talks with a UN peacekeeper after arriving in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Monday, Jan. 18, 2010. At left is Chelsea Clinton.   (AP Photo/Lynne Sladky)

Bill Clinton visited Port-au-Prince today, touring a hospital and praising the Haitian people as "heroic." The former president, who is also a UN special envoy to Haiti, helped deliver medicine and other supplies. "I'll be surprised and disappointed if 48 hours from now we're not feeding and bringing fresh water to dramatically larger amounts of people," said Clinton, who was traveling with daughter Chelsea.

In response to accusations that aid has been slow to arrive, Clinton defended the relief effort. "The infrastructure broke down, and that's what we're building up," he told AFP. "It's astonishing what the Haitians have been able to accomplish, performing surgeries at night, with lights, with no anesthesia, using vodka to sterilize equipment," he said.
(More Bill Clinton stories.)

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