PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti _ Hurricane Matthew left Haiti with at least 108 people dead and "catastrophic" damage, Haitian officials said Thursday.
"The situation is catastrophic," President Jocelerme Privert said. "The situation is critical."
Interior Minister Francois Anick Joseph confirmed the number of dead. In a NEWS conference Thursday, Haitian officials said more than 28,000 houses have been damaged so far but evaluation is only in the initial stages. All international assistance will be coordinated through the Haitian government, they said, as the nation began the painful assessment of damage.
Government ministers will deploy across the country Thursday in helicopters and SUVS to assess the damage.
More than 21,000 people remained in shelters, according to Edgar Celestin, spokesman from the Office of Protection Civil said. He said the number of deaths and the amount of damage both are expected to rise, especially in hard hit areas like the Grand' Anse.
The department on Haiti's southern peninsula remains mostly cut off from communication, with the worst damage reported from Port Salut West to Dame Marie. Other parts of the country were also seeing major damage.
"Everybody's house is destroyed, the people can't eat and have to drink coconut water to sustain them," said Sen. Francky Exius, who is from Les Cayes.
Exius, who complained about the slow response of the government, said two bridges are damaged in Port Salut.
"The people are demoralized, they have no hope," he said.
Reports also began coming in Thursday on widespread devastation in Jeremie, in the Grand' Anse, where food was reported to be scarce with gardens destroyed.
Jean-Michel Vigreux, CARE Haiti country director, reported that 80 percent of the buildings were destroyed.
"All phone lines and electricity are down. Access is completely cut off, and everyone is running out of food and money. The bank is offline. Everyone is very shaken up," he reported.
In Arcahaie, the biggest banana-growing region in Haiti, approximately 80 percent of banana crops were destroyed by winds and flooding, reported Christy Delafield, a spokeswoman for Mercy Corps, a nonprofit providing humanitarian relief in the country.
Delafield said in an email that the destroyed banana crops supported about 20,000 families in the region, and that farmers may have difficulty replanting the crops because of salt water intrusion from flooding.
Cholera has also been a fear in the wake of the storm. Even before the hurricane, more than 27,000 cases of cholera had been reported this year in Haiti.
Vigreux reported three cases in the hospital but the facility has no generator. Since the large cholera outbreak in Haiti in 2010, the epidemic has been contained but outbreaks continue.
Vigreux also reported that Jacmel, capital of the Department South-East, was hit hard, with the number of people in shelters rising from 2,700 to 4,000.
The U.S., Venezuela and Holland have all offered aid to Haiti in the aftermath of the storm. A humanitarian flight from Venezuela flew into Haiti yesterday with supplies to help victims.
On Wednesday, Haiti postponed its scheduled rerun of the presidential elections that had been set for Sunday. No new date has been set.
