HELICOPTERS ferried in food and medicine to devastated south-western Haiti yesterday, but aid workers had difficulty reaching increasingly desperate communities still isolated almost a week after Hurricane Matthew.

Power was still off, water and food were scarce and officials said that young men in villages along the road between the hard-hit cities of Les Cayes and Jeremie were putting up blockades of rocks and broken branches to halt convoys of vehicles bringing relief supplies.

One convoy carrying food, water and medications was attacked by armed men in a remote valley where there had been a mudslide, said Frednel Kedler, co-ordinator for the civil protection agency in the Grand-Anse department that includes Jeremie.