Hurricane Melissa blasted Cuba and Haiti with torrential rain and howling winds on Wednesday, inflicting even more damage just hours after it devastated parts of Jamaica, ripping the roofs off homes and hospitals, flooding villages and littering roads with trees and electrical poles.

In both Haiti and Jamaica, the authorities began to tally the dead. Around 20 people, including children, died in a Haitian community where swollen rivers spilled into homes, and at least three bodies were found in St. Elizabeth, a hard-hit parish in southwestern Jamaica, where Melissa struck the island as a Category 5 hurricane.

In that parish, the storm left a “complete disaster,” said Floyd Green, the agricultural minister. “Entire buildings have collapsed,” he said, adding that he had heard reports of vi

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