Home>News Center>World
         
 

Rain in Pakistan quake zone compounds disease fears
(AFP)
Updated: 2005-11-10 15:09

UN officials have warned that fresh rain in Pakistan's quake zone could have a "disastrous" effect on their struggle to contain an outbreak of acute diarrhoea.

There have been at least 200 cases and possibly as many as 750 at one camp for homeless quake survivors in Pakistani Kashmir, amid fears that it could be cholera, the World Health Organisation (WHO) and UNICEF said on Thursday.

"Rain would be disastrous," WHO emergency coordinator Rachel Lavy told AFP at the main camp on the sports ground of the devastated university in Muzaffarabad, the regional capital, where around 3,000 people are living.

"Diarrhoeal illness and rain water go hand in hand," she said.

Aid workers said they had succesfully treated existing cases and they were now focusing on prevention by teaching people how to keep clean, setting up an isolation tent for the sick and digging latrines.

Lavy said there were at least 200 cases of acute watery diarrhoea at the camp in the last five days, including 55 reported on Tuesday and 77 the following day. There have been no deaths so far.

Claudia Hudspeth, UNICEF's head of operations in Pakistani Kashmir, estimated that around 25 percent, or 750 people, at the university ground camp had been affected.

"If there is rain it will escalate the situation," she told AFP. "The hygiene situation is terrible in the camp. There is open defecation, kids are playing around -- it is quite a mess."

She added that there were more than 30 camps throughout Muzaffarabad, all of which could be affected and most of which did not have adequate sanitation and water supplies.

UN officials say the symptoms closely fit the definition of cholera but add that there are other waterborne microbes that could cause the condition.

"In a way it does not matter what it is, because acute watery diarrhoea is serious. The main thing is that we have to prevent the spread of disease," the WHO's Lavy added.

Light rain -- the first for six days -- started in quake-hit northern Pakistan and parts of Kashmir early Thursday, while snow is expected at night, the Pakistani meteorological department said.

"All earthquake affected areas will have intermittent rain today and Friday," a spokesman for the department said.



Suicide bombers kill 57 at Jordan hotels
Health experts plan regional stockpiles of antiviral drugs
Plane crash exercise in Manila
 
  Today's Top News     Top World News
 

3 Chinese among 57 killed in Jordan hotel bombings

 

   
 

Blair: China's rapid development not a threat

 

   
 

New outbreaks reported, 'situation serious'

 

   
 

Banker: No official adjustment of yuan rate

 

   
 

Panel urges US-China energy cooperation

 

   
 

Hostage stand-off ends in suicide blast

 

   
  3 Chinese among 57 killed in Jordan hotel bombings
   
  US tells North Korea to stop reactor now
   
  Rioting begins to slack off in France
   
  Asia terror chief believed killed in Indonesia
   
  US feds indict 2 in missile-smuggling scheme
   
  Saddam's defense team threatens to boycott
   
 
  Go to Another Section  
 
 
  Story Tools  
   
  Related Stories  
   
Possible cholera in Pakistan quake camps - WHO
   
China finishes shipment of relief goods for Pakistani quake victims
   
A month after quake, misery still ahead
  News Talk  
  Are the Republicans exploiting the memory of 9/11?  
Manufacturers, Exporters, Wholesalers - Global trade starts here.
Advertisement