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Excerpt from jamaica-gleaner.com
Students often throw up or wet themselves when gunfire erupts outside their school in northern Port-au-Prince.
When they do, school director Roseline Ceragui Louis finds that there is only one way to try to calm them and keep them safe: getting them to lie on the classroom floor while she sings softly.
“You can’t work in that environment,” she said. “It’s catastrophic. They’re traumatised.”
Haiti’s capital is under the onslaught of powerful gangs that control 80 per cent of of the city.
On February 29, gangs launched coordinated attacks targeting key infrastructure. The attacks have left more than 2,500 people dead or wounded in the first three months of the year. Now, in a bid to help save Haiti’s youngest generation, the country is undergoing a wider push to dispel a long-standing taboo on seeking therapy and talking about mental health.