PAKISTAN: Three days after earthquake, health risks grow

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

ISLAMABAD, 11 Oct 2005 (IRIN) - Three days after the devastating earthquake that hit mountainous parts of northern Pakistan and India, fears are growing that deteriorating sanitary conditions in the affected areas could provide a breeding for epidemics, officials said on Tuesday.

The disaster has killed at least 20,000 people, injured twice that number and left up to 4 million homeless and 1 million in immediate need of assistance. Many thousands more, buried under rubble or caught by the quake in remote areas, are feared dead.

"I believe the health situation is one the biggest concerns at the moment, with such a large number of dead and injured people. A lot of medical supplies are being provided and more are needed but… if water safety is not addressed and shelter needs are not attended to, we'll see huge health problems," Khalif Bile, head of the UN's World Health Organization (WHO) in Pakistan said in the capital, Islamabad.

"All kinds of essential medical supplies are needed - medicines for both acute as well as chronic diseases, for infection control, surgical care and orthopaedic care, essential drugs for children etc. While vaccination of children against infectious diseases is critical at the moment," he noted.

The WHO has dispatched 17 emergency medical teams, comprising of four to five members, to tremor-hit areas in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and Pakistani-administered Kashmir.

A damage assessment team made up of staff from national and international NGOs working in the worst hit areas of NWFP, including the districts of Swat, Shangla, Abbottabad, Battagram and Mansehra, has identified medical aid with drugs, vaccines and bandages as a top priority.

Most existing medical facilities in affected areas have been destroyed by the earthquake. Health authorities are responding by flying or trucking in field hospitals. "At least four hospitals are on their way but it'll take another couple of days," Bile said.

The medical charity Medicines Sans Frontiers (MSF) said that there was a risk of an epidemic of water-borne disease in Muzaffarabad, the quake-devastated capital of Pakistani-administered Kashmir.

"Under these circumstances when there is a lot of destruction, the existing water supply systems could become contaminated and ultimately that could lead to an outbreak of water-borne diseases," the Paris-based aid group's chief in Islamabad, Isabelle Simpson, said.

People with serious injuries are being referred to military and civil hospitals in the capital and other areas. "So far, around 2,000 injured [people] have been evacuated from Kashmir to various military hospitals in Rawalpindi, Gujranwala, Jehlum, Kharian, Mangla and Lahore districts of Punjab," Maj Gen Shaukat Sultan, spokesman of Pakistan's armed forces, said on Monday evening.

The need to secure clean water supplies as quickly as possible was underlined by others involved in the huge rescue and relief effort. "We are going to move to a very dangerous health situation. We need to make sure that fresh drinking water is brought in as soon as possible," Andrew Macleod, spokesman for the United Nations Disaster Assessment and Coordination (UNDAC) team, said in Islamabad.

[ENDS]