Hurricane Rai, one of the deadliest to hit the Philippines in recent years, has killed at least 388 people, the government said today, with epidemics threatening to break out in some of the affected areas.
The Civil Protection Secretariat said the total death toll had risen to 388, with 60 people still missing.
The previous official report put the death toll at 375.
Hundreds more people were injured.
On December 16 and 17, Hurricane Rai, carrying winds of up to 195 kilometers per hour, sowed death and destruction in the central and southern parts of the archipelago, uprooting roofs, trees, power poles, and demolishing wooden houses. its rains flooded many villages.
Hundreds of thousands of people were found homeless because of it.
More than four million people in 430 towns and villages, where some 482,000 homes were damaged or completely destroyed, have received or are going to seek help, the Civil Protection said.
More than 300,000 people are still in evacuation camps.
A new threat has emerged in recent days as the government distributes food, water and clothing to the affected areas: at least 140 people have fallen ill, possibly due to drinking contaminated water.
In the southern province of Dinaagat, 80 people have acute gastroenteritis, while 54 people need care as they have diarrhea at a hospital on the neighboring, very touristy island of Siargao, said Undersecretary of Health Maria Rosario Verheire.
In the city of Cebu, 16 cases of diarrhea have been reported, he added, informing representatives of the press.
Ms. Verhaeire stressed that the supply of drinking water has been interrupted in these areas and that the water supply pipelines have been damaged. “There is also the possibility of infection,” he said.
According to its ministry, the hurricane destroyed 4,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine and damaged 141 hospitals and clinics, of which only 30 were operating normally again.
The Philippines, one of the countries most considered to be exposed to climate change, is hit by some twenty tropical storms and / or hurricanes each year, destroying crops, homes and infrastructure in already impoverished areas.
SOURCE: AMPE
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Source From: Capital
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