Cyclone victims are in need of urgent succour
Wednesday, 3 June 2009
Ahmed Ali
THE government after a week's effort to provide succour to the cyclone-hit people has finally sought help from the international community. The powerlessness of the administration to carry out the relief and rehabilitation work for the victims of the latest cyclone accompanied by tidal surge on its own speaks volumes for the enormity of the havoc caused by the cyclone Aila.
Such frank admission on the part of the government is appreciated. The suffering humanity in the remote chars and the marooned villages is in need of immediate help. The injured have to be hospitalised as their wounds are festering. The dead have to be buried before those get decomposed. The children attacked with diarrhoea and other water-borne diseases and fighting death without water, medicine and food have to be saved. The people rendered homeless need shelter. To cut the long story short, the extent of the damage to life and property in the districts ravaged by the cyclone and tidal surge is simply appalling. In such an hour of need, the administration cannot afford to be so vain as not to ask for assistance from the aid agencies and international donors.
It has been learnt that the government is yet to assess the scale of destruction caused by Aila. What is more, Food and Disaster Management Minister Abdur Razzak admitted to the media that the government has not even been able to calculate the amount of money it would need to carry out the works for rehabilitation of the cyclone victims and rebuild the infrastructure of the affected areas.
The worst-hit districts in the south-western part of the country are in desperate need for urgent help. The trails devastation the cyclone Aila had left in its wake are gradually becoming clear. Reports coming from the north-western coastal districts of the country are grim and horrifying. Since each and every natural calamity has its own characteristic way of destroying lives and properties, comparisons among them are often hard to make. Last year, it was the Sidr that struck he north-western districts washed by the Bay of Bengal. Seeing the fury of that cyclone and the destruction it caused, it was said that it was the worst ever in recent memory. The Aila that ripped through the south-western as well as northern district before it crossed into the districts of West Bengal in the neighbouring India was initially thought to be less destructive, though more widespread. But even after a week, those looking after the relief and rescue operations in the government as well as under the various non-government and privately-run initiatives have been stumbling upon fresh evidences of how deep the latest cyclone and the tidal waves that followed hard on its heels had struck and left their own marks of devastation. As the Aila descended on Bangladesh, as if from nowhere, by day, it again caught its victims by surprise in the coastal belt districts or in other parts of the country by surprise. However, had it visited upon the population by night, its impact could be still worse. Unfortunately, as it came by the day out of the blue, the preparedness in terms of early warning was also poor. As a consequence, the magnitude of the damage and the suffering of the people it caused are becoming clear with every passing day.
The reports streaming in are horrific indeed. The tidal waves that swept the districts hit by the cyclone filled all the water bodies in the affected districts. As a result, salty water filled with dirt, rotting leaves and corpses of animals have made the surface water of those areas undrinkable. People are crying for water. In the different upazilas of Satkhira, one of the worst-hit coastal districts, the victims have to travel miles in the hope of getting some drinking water. They have lost all their sources of drinking and cooking water to salty water left behind by the tidal surge. The worst sufferers are the children, the women, the old and the infirm who cannot travel long distances where potable water might be available. Those who are being compelled to drink and cook their foods with stinking salty water are but inviting disease and death earlier than the more fortunate ones. In consequence, the death toll in the affected areas is increasing. People are therefore in desperate needs of water and food in the areas closer to the sea that reportedly went 13 to 15 feet under water during the initial impact of the cyclone and the tidal surge.
Lack of pure water is causing extreme forms of dehydration and diarrhoea. The victims are in immediate need of oral saline to survive until the full medical support to treat diarrhoea arrives. The relief and rescue teams in action should, therefore, make it a point to include oral saline in their emergency packets of food and water for the cyclone victims. Cyclone victims in numerous villages under the Shyamnagar, Assasuni, Dakop and Koira upazilas under Satkhira and Khulna districts are in a condition of extreme emergency. They need food, water and medicine. Similarly, the districts of Patuakhali, Barguna, Barisal, Satkhira, Bagerhat and Noakhali, too, are in a desperate situation as diarrhoea is reported to have been fast spreading in those districts.
The directorate of health informs that some 891 medical teams have been sent to the cyclone-hit districts. But what is needed at this point most is to prioritise the areas, especially to those where no help has so far reached. The remotely placed Char areas must get the highest attention from the authorities concerned in this respect.
The emergency help should now go deeper into the cyclone-battered areas to meet the demands of the neediest. At the same time, equipped with this experience, the authorities will have to learn to take advanced preparations against similar types of calamities that are most likely to hit the country in the future.
In the face of the latest natural calamity that struck the country on May 25, the government will have to assess properly and quantify the damage caused by the cyclone and tidal wave in terms of life, property and infrastructures. The donor agencies would need this information most before they are able to extend necessary assistance to the cyclone victims of Bangladesh.
THE government after a week's effort to provide succour to the cyclone-hit people has finally sought help from the international community. The powerlessness of the administration to carry out the relief and rehabilitation work for the victims of the latest cyclone accompanied by tidal surge on its own speaks volumes for the enormity of the havoc caused by the cyclone Aila.
Such frank admission on the part of the government is appreciated. The suffering humanity in the remote chars and the marooned villages is in need of immediate help. The injured have to be hospitalised as their wounds are festering. The dead have to be buried before those get decomposed. The children attacked with diarrhoea and other water-borne diseases and fighting death without water, medicine and food have to be saved. The people rendered homeless need shelter. To cut the long story short, the extent of the damage to life and property in the districts ravaged by the cyclone and tidal surge is simply appalling. In such an hour of need, the administration cannot afford to be so vain as not to ask for assistance from the aid agencies and international donors.
It has been learnt that the government is yet to assess the scale of destruction caused by Aila. What is more, Food and Disaster Management Minister Abdur Razzak admitted to the media that the government has not even been able to calculate the amount of money it would need to carry out the works for rehabilitation of the cyclone victims and rebuild the infrastructure of the affected areas.
The worst-hit districts in the south-western part of the country are in desperate need for urgent help. The trails devastation the cyclone Aila had left in its wake are gradually becoming clear. Reports coming from the north-western coastal districts of the country are grim and horrifying. Since each and every natural calamity has its own characteristic way of destroying lives and properties, comparisons among them are often hard to make. Last year, it was the Sidr that struck he north-western districts washed by the Bay of Bengal. Seeing the fury of that cyclone and the destruction it caused, it was said that it was the worst ever in recent memory. The Aila that ripped through the south-western as well as northern district before it crossed into the districts of West Bengal in the neighbouring India was initially thought to be less destructive, though more widespread. But even after a week, those looking after the relief and rescue operations in the government as well as under the various non-government and privately-run initiatives have been stumbling upon fresh evidences of how deep the latest cyclone and the tidal waves that followed hard on its heels had struck and left their own marks of devastation. As the Aila descended on Bangladesh, as if from nowhere, by day, it again caught its victims by surprise in the coastal belt districts or in other parts of the country by surprise. However, had it visited upon the population by night, its impact could be still worse. Unfortunately, as it came by the day out of the blue, the preparedness in terms of early warning was also poor. As a consequence, the magnitude of the damage and the suffering of the people it caused are becoming clear with every passing day.
The reports streaming in are horrific indeed. The tidal waves that swept the districts hit by the cyclone filled all the water bodies in the affected districts. As a result, salty water filled with dirt, rotting leaves and corpses of animals have made the surface water of those areas undrinkable. People are crying for water. In the different upazilas of Satkhira, one of the worst-hit coastal districts, the victims have to travel miles in the hope of getting some drinking water. They have lost all their sources of drinking and cooking water to salty water left behind by the tidal surge. The worst sufferers are the children, the women, the old and the infirm who cannot travel long distances where potable water might be available. Those who are being compelled to drink and cook their foods with stinking salty water are but inviting disease and death earlier than the more fortunate ones. In consequence, the death toll in the affected areas is increasing. People are therefore in desperate needs of water and food in the areas closer to the sea that reportedly went 13 to 15 feet under water during the initial impact of the cyclone and the tidal surge.
Lack of pure water is causing extreme forms of dehydration and diarrhoea. The victims are in immediate need of oral saline to survive until the full medical support to treat diarrhoea arrives. The relief and rescue teams in action should, therefore, make it a point to include oral saline in their emergency packets of food and water for the cyclone victims. Cyclone victims in numerous villages under the Shyamnagar, Assasuni, Dakop and Koira upazilas under Satkhira and Khulna districts are in a condition of extreme emergency. They need food, water and medicine. Similarly, the districts of Patuakhali, Barguna, Barisal, Satkhira, Bagerhat and Noakhali, too, are in a desperate situation as diarrhoea is reported to have been fast spreading in those districts.
The directorate of health informs that some 891 medical teams have been sent to the cyclone-hit districts. But what is needed at this point most is to prioritise the areas, especially to those where no help has so far reached. The remotely placed Char areas must get the highest attention from the authorities concerned in this respect.
The emergency help should now go deeper into the cyclone-battered areas to meet the demands of the neediest. At the same time, equipped with this experience, the authorities will have to learn to take advanced preparations against similar types of calamities that are most likely to hit the country in the future.
In the face of the latest natural calamity that struck the country on May 25, the government will have to assess properly and quantify the damage caused by the cyclone and tidal wave in terms of life, property and infrastructures. The donor agencies would need this information most before they are able to extend necessary assistance to the cyclone victims of Bangladesh.