1982 to January 1983 · Haitianspan
Haitian tourism falls from 200,000 visitors to 10,000
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Haiti had been receiving about 200,000 visitors a year. In the season of 1982 to 1983 it received 10,000. The AIDS story did that, arriving in south Florida among a public already hostile to Haitian boats. Haitians in the United States were asked not to give blood. Newspapers recalled the export of Haitian plasma under the Duvaliers and described ceremonies in which the blood of freshly killed animals is drunk. A businessman flying into New York was told by the passport inspector to open the document himself, because the inspector did not want to touch it. The government closed the few guest houses that had served foreign gay tourists, which was a measure about publicity rather than health. Haiti ended 1982 with imports exceeding exports by some 40 million dollars and no season ahead of it. A bomb went off near the palace on New Year's Eve. The Duvaliers were out and unhurt, and the Te Deum the next day was cancelled for the first time within memory. Their son Nicolas was born on 31 January 1983.
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