Disease breaks out in quake zone <TABLE style="WIDTH: 405px; HEIGHT: 44px; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0><TBODY><TR><TD class=caption style="WIDTH: 360px">
October 31 2008 at 12:13PM</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
Wam, Pakistan - Hundreds of children left homeless by a devastating earthquake in southwest Pakistan are suffering from potentially life-threatening dysentery and pneumonia, a health official said on Friday.
The outbreak of disease comes two days after up to 300 people were killed and scores more were injured by the 6.4-magnitude earthquake in impoverished Baluchistan province.
"Due to the cold hundreds of children are being treated for pneumonia, abdominal diseases, diarrhoea and chest problems," the district health officer of the stricken hill town of Ziarat, Ayub Kakar, told AFP.
He said there was still a shortage of vital tents, blankets and clothes for people sleeping in the open in villages near Ziarat, as temperatures plunged below zero as winter sets in.
We fear the death toll will rise. Such diseases, if not treated in time, are life-threatening," Kakar said, adding that there was a shortage of medicines and antibiotics in the region.
He said children formed the majority of the population in the area, estimating that between 25 000 and 30 000 of them were affected.
"Many women have not been taken to local dispensaries and hospitals because of the conservative society. That's why we are sending our teams to them to the affected areas to treat women and children," Kakar said.
Many children were also psychologically affected by the quake, he said.
The Pakistani military said it had provided tents, blankets and food to about 25 000 affected people in the devastated villages of Wam, Tungi and Gogi, with another 15 000 set to get relief goods later on Friday.
"Nobody will be without tents, blankets and food rations today," Major Khan Mohammed of the paramilitary Frontier Corps told AFP.
Colonel Shahzada Khan said the International Committee of the Red Cross had sent 5 000 relief kits, each consisting of one tent and 15 days' rations for a family of five.
"An aerial survey is still being conducted by helicopters in far-flung areas to locate the affected people," said Shahzada, also from the Corps. - AFP http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_i...3222101C744867
October 31 2008 at 12:13PM</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
Wam, Pakistan - Hundreds of children left homeless by a devastating earthquake in southwest Pakistan are suffering from potentially life-threatening dysentery and pneumonia, a health official said on Friday.
The outbreak of disease comes two days after up to 300 people were killed and scores more were injured by the 6.4-magnitude earthquake in impoverished Baluchistan province.
"Due to the cold hundreds of children are being treated for pneumonia, abdominal diseases, diarrhoea and chest problems," the district health officer of the stricken hill town of Ziarat, Ayub Kakar, told AFP.
He said there was still a shortage of vital tents, blankets and clothes for people sleeping in the open in villages near Ziarat, as temperatures plunged below zero as winter sets in.
We fear the death toll will rise. Such diseases, if not treated in time, are life-threatening," Kakar said, adding that there was a shortage of medicines and antibiotics in the region.
He said children formed the majority of the population in the area, estimating that between 25 000 and 30 000 of them were affected.
"Many women have not been taken to local dispensaries and hospitals because of the conservative society. That's why we are sending our teams to them to the affected areas to treat women and children," Kakar said.
Many children were also psychologically affected by the quake, he said.
The Pakistani military said it had provided tents, blankets and food to about 25 000 affected people in the devastated villages of Wam, Tungi and Gogi, with another 15 000 set to get relief goods later on Friday.
"Nobody will be without tents, blankets and food rations today," Major Khan Mohammed of the paramilitary Frontier Corps told AFP.
Colonel Shahzada Khan said the International Committee of the Red Cross had sent 5 000 relief kits, each consisting of one tent and 15 days' rations for a family of five.
"An aerial survey is still being conducted by helicopters in far-flung areas to locate the affected people," said Shahzada, also from the Corps. - AFP http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_i...3222101C744867
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