Haiti sees spike in cholera deaths

Al-Jazeera.net: The death toll from Haiti's cholera outbreak has soared to 917 as officials struggled to contain the growing epidemic threatening the quake-ravaged country. The previous official toll announced two days earlier was 796. Authorities on Sunday said 14,642 people had been treated in hospitals since the disease took hold in the desperately poor Caribbean nation.

Officials fear the scale of the epidemic could increase exponentially if cholera infiltrates makeshift camps in the capital city of Port-au-Prince, where hundreds of thousands of earthquake survivors live in cramped and unsanitary conditions.

A January earthquake flattened much of the capital, leaving more than 250,000 people dead and an estimated 1.3 million of Haiti's 10 million population displaced. International organisations have stepped up appeals for funds to bring in more doctors, medicine and water purification equipment. The United Nations is asking for $164m to fight the epidemic, which has gained strength over the past week….