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As the news team veered off the Morant Bay main road and onto a rough dirt track leading to the Church Corner Landfill, the haunting scenes from Anthony B's music video Mr. Heartless instantly comes to mind.

Children and young men, their clothes stained with sweat, scoured the garbage heaps for plastic bottles, scrap metal, and anything else of value. Vultures circled above while goats and pigs wandered through the trash, adding to the sense of desperation in the air.

Dozens of dilapidated board houses, barely visible behind zinc fences, dotted the landscape. Plastic bottles overflowed in yards and gateways as residents waited for the recycling truck to make its rounds. The stench of rotting waste and stagnant water filled the air, but the people living here appeared numb to it all.

This is the harsh, unrelenting reality for the over 200 residents of Salt Lane, near Morant Bay St Thomas. The community is tucked away beside the landfill. Among those struggling to survive is 50-year-old Dorothy Anderson, who lives just steps from the landfill with her family.

Anderson, who has lived closest to the site for years, has resorted to using old vehicles to block the garbage from invading her space. But these efforts often fail; every time it rains, her yard is flooded with debris and wastewater.

Sitting in the yard, Anderson watches her grandchildren play. A toddler crawls through the mud while others take turns riding a broken bicycle. But behind her eyes is a deep sadness - she hasn't had a good laugh in years.

"Sometimes mi just sit down and look into life. Mi couldn't tell when last mi happy. Mi diabetic, so a usually take insulin every morning, but a from last year July mi nuh take any because mi can't afford it. If mi even get a little change, mi just cook little food and supme. When mi don't take the insulin, mi entire body scratch mi and if yuh notice how mi foot crawb up. Mi swell up sometimes too. Sometimes mi boil the mango leaves and drink it," she said.

Anderson's living conditions are a far cry from what anyone would consider habitable. Her family, more than 20 people in total, crams into a collection of broken-down board houses. The garbage from the landfill finds its way into their yard, further complicating their already difficult existence. Her diabetes, combined with poor nutrition and constant stress, has contributed to her obesity, and this condition has a profound impact on her daily life.

"Every time mi fi go hospital, I have to pay $2,000 because the taxi have to come around here for me. Normally, it would be $600 for a regular taxi to go and come from the hospital, but I can't do the long walking because shortness of breath come down on mi," she explained.

"Some people say we are a disgrace to the community and they are discriminating us. The entire house is rotting down and people a say a long time we live round here and a now we want help. Right now mi wish mi children dem did live inna better homes but dem stay with mi because dem nuh have nuh better way and plus we want to stay close to each other," she said.

Sharlene Stewart, Anderson's 32-year-old daughter, lies across from her on an old mattress in the yard. If it weren't for her elevated blood pressure, Stewart says she would be out on the landfill, collecting plastic bottles for recycling. Despite the filth and the danger, it's the garbage dump that provides the means for their daily meals.

"It hard to go on the dump go collect the bottles and a lot of times mi bigger sister Jody help. Mi get up early and after mi send the kids to school, and about 8 a.m. mi go out on the dump to get bottles and a lot of times its in the night we come back. We have to stay out there and lay wait the truck to sell. We fat, so we don't go as fast as the others. Is $20 a pound for di bottles," Stewart said.

She gingerly gets off the mattress and walks barefooted through the mud, showing the news team the deteriorating state of the house. She points to her mother's room, which is missing crucial fixtures and is in desperate need of repair.

"Mi mada don't have a good bed and the spring in it juck her up. Night dew come in on her, so we have to use things and stuff it up, and when rain fall, it's another ting because water come in as you can imagine. The bottom board on her bed break, so we have to put something underneath it. Some a the board missing," Stewart said.

Her older sister, Jody-Ann Jackson, adds that while the children in the yard are on PATH, the benefits they receive are far from sufficient. She expressed a deep need for more support, both for her ailing mother and for the children.

"We want food and we need support for the kids. We are on PATH, but when yuh get a $2,000 for one month, it really can't do anything. Yuh can't give dem bus fare and lunch money out of that. Is about a dozen children live here and two more nuh born yet. Sometimes we can't buy food and a lot of times we cook one big pot a dumpling and butter. My children's fathers nuh take care a dem and is mi alone is mother and father to the four a dem. I don't know how mi manage sometimes because mi have to look it fi mi mommy too," Jackson said.

"A nuh keep we can't keep the man dem, but yuh see when time we get pregnant, mi don't know what wrong with dem because dem leave. Dem breed yuh and dash yuh whey and the frock tail dem whe dem have nuh better off more than we," she added.