The Israeli humanitarian aid organization IsraAID sent an emergency team to the Caribbean island of Saint Vincent after the eruption of the La Soufrière volcano, which covered nearby areas with ash and displaced around 20,000 people.

The volcano is located on the largest island of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Its outbreak in early April resulted in a mass evacuation in which people sought refuge in public and informal shelters where they faced urgent needs such as water supply and child protective support and public health guidance in the face of Covid-19.

IsraAID’s emergency response team arrived on the island in late April and has since focused on people seeking refuge in private, informal shelters, where they do not receive the same services as public, state shelters.

“At the moment we are only trying to evaluate the private accommodation and find out how we can support the children,” explains Tamar Kosky Lazarus, who heads the IsraAID mission in the region.

The resilience kits for children are designed to provide entertainment and reduce stress. Photo by IsraAID

Her team has distributed resilience kits for children that include activities developed by child protection experts to help relieve stress, keep children entertained, and give parents who don’t yet know when their families will be able to return home to get some rest grant.

“The big problem we’re seeing right now is that people don’t know when to go home,” she says. “People don’t know how their homes have been affected.”

Kosky Lazarus notes that the mission is working closely with community groups, government officials and grassroots organizations and plans to stay on the island for the next several months. More experts will join in to work on the problems that resolve.

“We continue to evaluate the need for water and also the possibility of the needs of health workers as they have been evicted themselves,” she says.

In April, IsraAID was one of two Israeli NGOs to send aid to India as it faces a catastrophic wave of Covid.