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Aid Scarce For 20 Million Stranded In South Asia Floods
New Delhi (AFP) Aug 02, 2007 Relief teams in India, Bangladesh and Nepal on Thursday battled to bring food, clean drinking water and medicines to nearly 20 million people stranded in massive flooding. More than 1,100 people have died across South Asia since the start of the annual monsoon season in mid-June, with the region's rivers bursting their banks due to relentless rains and snows melting in the Himalayas. Britain and the United Nations have stepped up to assist local authorities, with London pledging 2.5 million dollars in aid and the world body launching emergency relief operations. Northern and eastern India has borne the brunt of the disaster, with 1,000 people dead and about 14 million villagers in Assam, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh states awaiting much-needed aid amid fears that disease could soon spread. "Whatever baby food I had is now exhausted and there is no alternative other than trying to forcibly feed my daughter boiled rice," 27-year-old Rahima Begum, whose home near the Brahmaputra River in Assam is under water, told AFP. "My son is down with fever and diarrhoea for the last two days," said labourer Bhairab Madhab, who like Begum lives in the village of Senimari. "Getting a doctor is a distant dream with flood waters surrounding us." Some 5.5 million people have been displaced in Assam, nearly seven million others are stranded in Bihar state, where 3,000 villages have been inundated, officials said. Another 1.5 million have been displaced in Uttar Pradesh. "Some of these areas are very far-flung," Uttar Pradesh spokesman Shrish Dubey said. Twenty-eight people drowned in the state Wednesday when a boat carrying both aid workers and evacuees splintered apart. An official in Bihar's hard-hit Darbhanga district said the area had been drenched with 875 millimetres (three feet) of rain in July, more than three times what it received during the entire monsoon season last year. The Indian capital New Delhi was also battered with rain overnight, receiving 166 millimetres of rain in a 24-hour span, more than half its average for the entire month of August. In neighbouring Bangladesh, where 54 people have lost their lives, officials said 5.6 million had been displaced or marooned in their homes, with about 160,000 now housed in shelters. Britain's Department for International Development announced Thursday that it would give 2.5 million dollars to the relief effort for food, water, shelter and medicine for flood victims. The United Nations has started flying emergency relief operations to assist hundreds of thousands of Nepalis affected by monsoon-triggered floods and landslides, the world body said. At least 84 people have been killed since the start of the monsoon season, according to Nepal's home ministry. Hundreds of thousands have been displaced and are at heightened risk of contracting water-borne diseases, Nepal's health ministry warned this week. Aid organisations have emphasised the need for quick relief efforts, warning the death toll could rise if villagers resort to drinking stagnant flood waters. "Providing safe drinking water and addressing public health is essential because it saves lives," Lalchand Garg, Oxfam's manager in eastern India, said in a statement. Monsoon rains that sweep the subcontinent from June through September are crucial for farmers and the economy, but also cause massive property damage and hundreds of deaths annually.
Source: Agence France-Presse Related Links Bringing Order To A World Of Disasters When the Earth Quakes A world of storm and tempest
Death Toll In India Floods Reaches 112
Kaziranga (AFP) India, July 31, 2007The death toll from floods ravaging large parts of eastern and northeastern India climbed to 112 with about seven million people displaced, officials and reports said Tuesday. In the eastern state of Bihar, 62 people died in flood-related incidents as 2.8 million people were displaced, the United News of India reported. Educational institutions in north Bihar were closed as water entered schools and other administrative buildings, the report said. |
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