Death toll likely to rise as aid fails to reach survivors
Sun, May 11, 2008
The Straits Times
Bogalay - Since last week's cyclone, Ms Dowla Shwe says, her five children have only had bananas and coconuts to eat. Her starving brood has not seen any assistance nearly a week after a devastating cyclone ripped through Myanmar.
'We have nothing,' she says, nodding towards her starving kids while sitting forlornly by the roadside in the southern Irrawaddy delta. 'They are getting weak, and I fear they will fall sick and die.'
More than a million survivors of the disaster remain without aid, the United Nations said yesterday, with emergency supply shipments still held up by the regime.
State media said 60,000 people were killed or missing in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis while foreign officials estimate the death toll at closer to 100,000.
UN officials have said they fear that the toll could rise if the people in need of help are not reached soon, especially with more bad weather approaching.
'With major rainfall predicted, starting over the weekend, this is a very grave concern,' said Mr Richard Horsey, spokesman for the UN's emergency relief arm. 'It's a race against time.'
Few countries have the capability to deal with a disaster of this magnitude, and Myanmar's plight is magnified by its status as one of the poorest nations in Asia, aid experts say.
Mr Andrew Brookes, an aerospace specialist at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, an independent think tank, estimates that the country has only 15 transport planes and fewer than 40 helicopters.
The planes, he said, are not capable of carrying tonnes of food, while many of the helicopters no longer work.
'Even if they (the helicopters) were all serviceable, it's not even a drop in the ocean,' he said. 'The task is so awesome. It would faze even a sophisticated force like the British, French or Germans.'
The combined effort of relief agencies and the government took aid to only 220,000 of up to 1.9 million people in the first six days after the storm, including those left homeless, injured or subject to disease and hunger, according to the International Red Cross.
'There are problems in getting the aid inside (Myanmar), and there are problems in getting the aid out to the delta area,' Danish Red Cross director Anders Ladekarl said in a satellite telephone interview from Myanmar to Danish broadcaster DR.
'We are simply lacking transportation. There are almost no boats and no helicopters.'
Running the operation is 'really a nightmare', he added.
