A week has passed since the hurricane tore through this remote stretch of Haiti’s southern peninsula, leaving an apocalyptic landscape of treeless countryside, disarticulated homes and a land robbed of its natural riches.

But for many, the torment has only started. Cholera, the disease at the heart of Haiti’s last disaster, is being spread again by this one.

About 10,000 people have died and hundreds of thousands have been sickened since cholera first appeared in late 2010. Scientists say it was brought to Haiti by United Nations peacekeepers stationed at a base that leaked waste into a river. After years of deflecting blame, the United Nations this summer acknowledged “its own involvement” in the suffering Haiti has experienced from the disease.

Now, cholera is stalking the areas gutted by the hurricane, a long peninsula of coastal towns and mountain villages where clean water was already hard to find, long before the storm. Here in the remote town of Rendel, a grueling four-hour trek to the nearest paved road, the disease has spread to every crevice of this valley and the hills above.

“We are all at risk,” said the last official in Rendel, Pierre Cenel, the magistrate.

A father raced down the hill to the clinic with his young daughter draped over his back, clutching her legs, his face fixed in fear.

“She must have cholera,” the magistrate said. “He is running to save her life.”

Cholera was creeping through the mountains even before the hurricane, claiming the lives of untold numbers as its pushed toward town. First came the sick, who trudged down to Rendel, desperate for medical care.

Then, when the floods came, cholera was carried down by the water itself, which swept up fecal matter dumped on the hillsides, contaminating the river and other drinking supplies.