Haiti continues to suffer devastating effects from Hurricane Sandy that hit the Caribbean nation before making its way north.

Residents of Leogane, Haiti find higher ground as the water level continues to rise Friday, Oct. 26, 2012. (photo: The Miami Herald, Carl Juste) Though Haiti missed a direct hit from the hurricane, the storm brought heavy rains, and with them an increase in the cases of cholera.

Floodwaters have also brought down homes, blocked roads and destroyed bridges.

“Floodwater had been receding since Sunday but more than 18,000 homes have been flooded, damaged or destroyed,” Jens Laerke, spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) told reporters in Geneva, and added that there are growing fears of a food crisis.

This newest loss of homes will add further misery to the nation that still has over 350,000 people living in tents since the catastrophic earthquake of January 2010.

Haiti Relief and Reconstruction Watch adds: "Newly homeless means more people thrown into a state of vulnerability: vulnerable to cholera and other illness and disease, vulnerable to rape and gender-based violence, vulnerable to hunger, and vulnerable to forced eviction when/if these people move into displaced persons settlements."

At least 50 people died from Hurricane Sandy in Haiti.