Cholera cases are rising in Haiti, according to Health Ministry figures obtained by AFP on Tuesday, raising fears of a new disaster in a country already mired in a humanitarian and security crisis.

As of Monday, 606 suspected cases and 66 confirmed cases had been identified, according to a ministry report.

That’s an increase of 222 new suspected cases between October 13 and 17. In addition, 22 deaths were recorded in medical institutions.

Suspected cases were also registered in new regions of the impoverished Caribbean state, especially in the central region.

One of the epicenters of the disease is the civil prison in Port-au-Prince, with 271 suspected cases, 12 confirmed and 14 dead, the ministry report said.

The new assessment comes a day after a meeting at the United Nations where the Security Council discussed sending an international task force to Haiti to deal with the humanitarian and security crisis.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described the situation as “absolutely nightmarish,” with criminal gangs blockading the country’s main oil terminal.

Speaking to the United Nations, Haitian Foreign Minister Jean Victor Geneus said he had “the delicate mission of taking the cry of distress of an entire suffering people before the Security Council and saying loud and clear that Haitians don’t live, they survive.”

As cholera cases continue to rise, protests have resumed in Port-au-Prince and across the country to demand the resignation of Prime Minister Ariel Henry.

Not far from the US embassy, ??a demonstration involving several hundred people was broken up with tear gas on Monday.

Haiti suffered from a cholera epidemic accidentally brought in by UN peacekeepers between 2010 and 2019, killing more than 10,000 people.