May I say at the start that CNN has done a consistently good job in Haiti?  They are right up there with the New York Times and others. Also, a suggestion: Anderson Cooper should not be on regularly once the disaster is over. He’s very good at this kind of thing, but he’s not a everyday, big time “TeeVee” personality. Make him into a specialist and use him more sparingly (CNN never does anything sparingly, does it?, with 24 hours a day to fill). Cooper is maybe too much to take, day to day. Too much sharp eyed staring into the camera, making the dramatic, you must watch, point. In the disaster zone, it works. Elsewhere, not so much.

There is reason to praise CNN, but some should go to CNN.com, as well, which is more useful, and easily accessible, than the jabbering television channel. They have put together “the numbers” from the earthquake. I still don’t accept these numbers completely, but they are useful as a guide. Given the crowding in Port au Prince, with large families jammed into small spaces, it is not unreasonable to believe that 150,000 people died.

One brain dead Washington, DC, local station was saying a day after the earthquake that 500,000 people had died. Where’d they get that? Why did they treat as though it were fact? Mainly, because the people working there have no common sense. How can you come up with a figure like that within 24 hours of a major disaster where most of the buildings were destroyed?

end

CNN has compiled the latest, most reliable figures available as the devastation continues to unfold:

THE TOLL

150,000: Latest estimate of the death toll, from the Haitian Health Ministry. The European Union and the Pan American Health Organization, which are coordinating the health-sector response, have estimated the quake killed 200,000 people.
194,000: Number of injured
134: Estimated number of people rescued by international search teams since the quake

THE EFFECT

9 million: Population of Haiti
3 million: Estimated number of people affected by the quake
1 million: Estimated number of displaced people
800,000 to 1 million: People who need temporary shelter
235,000: People who have left Port-au-Prince using free transportation provided by the government. The number who left by private means is undetermined.
At least 50: Aftershocks of magnitude 4.5 or higher that have hit Haiti since the January 12 quake

Full coverage

THE CHILDREN

300,000: Children younger than 2 who need nutritional support
90: Percentage of schools in Port-au-Prince that have been destroyed
263: Haitian orphans who have been evacuated

THE RESPONSE IN DOLLARS

$1.12 billion: International aid pledges
$783 million: Funds received as of Tuesday
$317 million: U.S. assistance as of Monday

iReport: Haiti's missing and found | Are you there?

THE RESPONSE IN MANPOWER

17,000: U.S. military personnel in and around Haiti
8 million: Meals the World Food Programme has delivered to nearly 400,000 people
300: Aid distribution sites that are up and running
130 to 150: Flights arriving every day at the single-runway Port-au-Prince airport with aid

EFFECT ON FOREIGNERS

12,000: U.N. workers in the country at the time of the quake
53: U.N. workers still missing
At least 82: U.N. workers dead
27: U.N. workers injured or hospitalized
11,500: Americans and family members who have been evacuated
4,800: Americans unaccounted for