| Earthquake survivors still living on the edge
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A UMNS photo by Paul Jeffrey/ACT
A man unloads relief supplies provided by Church World Service/ACT from a Pakistan Army helicopter in Banna, Pakistan.
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| A
man unloads relief supplies provided by Church World Service/ACT from a
Pakistan Army helicopter in Banna, Pakistan, following the Oct. 8
earthquake. The United Methodist Committee on Relief is working with
Church World Service to assist earthquake survivors, particularly in
northern Pakistan and Kashmir. A UMNS photo by Paul Jeffrey/Action by
Churches Together. Photo #05-793. Accompanies UMNS stories #663 and
#664. 11/30/05 |
Nov. 30, 2005
By United Methodist News Service*
Winter weather has left
hundreds of thousands of South Asian earthquake survivors still without
proper shelter, according to relief organizations.
As a consequence, the first cold-related
deaths were reported Nov. 29 by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.
Two children died of pneumonia and a man died of hypothermia, according
to the United Nations.
The Oct. 8 earthquake killed an estimated
80,000 people and left up to 3 million homeless. Snow has started to
block delivery of relief supplies by helicopter or road to the affected
villages in the Himalayas.
The United Methodist Committee on Relief
is working with Church World Service to assist earthquake survivors,
particularly in northern Pakistan and Kashmir.
Another emerging problem, according to
Marvin Parvez, CWS Pakistan-Afghanistan regional director, is that many
of the emergency tents already distributed are not winterized, prompting
some to light fires inside the tents. In Maiddan, a village north of
Islamabad destroyed by the earthquake, two children have died because of
a tent fire, he reported.
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A UMNS photo by Paul Jeffrey/ACT
A man walks through a "tent city" supported by Church World Service/ACT outside Balakot, Pakistan.
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man walks through a "tent city" supported by Church World Service/ACT
outside Balakot, Pakistan. Hundreds of survivors of the Oct. 8
earthquake, which killed an estimated 80,000 people, live in the camp.
The United Methodist Committee on Relief is working with Church World
Service to assist earthquake survivors, particularly in northern
Pakistan and Kashmir. A UMNS photo by Paul Jeffrey/Action by Churches
Together. Photo #05-794. Accompanies UMNS stories #663 and #664.
11/30/05 |
“Many of these survivors have never lived in tents, have no knowledge of
the fire hazards facing them, and they’re not being given basic fire
prevention instructions or any kind of fire-extinguishing equipment,”
Parvez said Oct. 28. “It only takes one candle.”
CWS is urging all
nongovernmental agencies responding in Pakistan “to work together to at
least give the survivors basic safety instructions.” With offices
throughout Pakistan, CWS is coordinator of the Pakistan Humanitarian
Forum
In Washington, Donna
Derr, director of the CWS Emergency Response Program, said basic
fire-extinguishing equipment should be part of tent or shelter supplies.
CWS is pursuing additional resources for alternative shelter options
and additional heating equipment and for solutions to the fire hazard
concerns.
On Nov. 5, CWS —
working with Finnchurchaid, Norwegian Church Aid and Great Britain’s
Christian Aid — distributed a donation from Finland’s Ministry of the
Interior that provided blankets, sweaters and enough winterized tents
and heaters to shelter 15,000 people.
Donations to the United
Methodist relief effort can be marked for “UMCOR Advance #232000,
Pakistan Earthquake,” and placed in church offering plates or sent to
UMCOR, P.O. Box 9068, New York, N.Y. 10087-9068. Contributions also can
be made by phone at (800) 554-8583 or online at www.methodistrelief.org. If funds are intended for recovery in a specific region, that should be noted. More information is available at http://gbgm-umc.org/umcor/emergency/earthquake/index.stm.
*Church World Service contributed information to this report.
News media contact: Linda Bloom, New York, (646) 369-3759 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
Related Articles
Disaster provides lessons as relief workers prepare for winter
Church World Service expands tent village for quake survivors
Shelter remains concern for earthquake victims
Pakistan quake took wrenching toll on children
Resources
ACT Slide Show
Church World Service: South Asia Quake
UMCOR: Earthquake
http://gbgm-umc.org/umcor/emergency/earthquake/index.stm
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