January 15, 2006	Sunday	Zilhaj 14, 1426

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ISLAMABAD, Jan 14: One hundred days have passed since the October 8 earthquake devastated northern Pakistan and yet the life saving phase is not over for the United Nations and its humanitarian partners. They stress that the harsh winter threatens the survival of tens of thousands of people living in spontaneous and unplanned camps after they were made homeless by the earthquake.

The demand for continued relief efforts was raised at a briefing in Islamabad on Saturday that cautioned that the onset of winter was increasingly testing the resilience of survivors and best efforts of all humanitarian workers.

Children and elderly remained particularly vulnerable to cold temperatures and acute respiratory diseases.

The briefing marked the one hundred days since the earthquake.

UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Pakistan Jan Vandemoortele said: “Some of the earlier focus on needs of people living above 5,000 feet snow-line must now be shifted to urgent requirements of people who are living in more than 100 unplanned camps in earthquake affected areas of Kashmir and North West Frontier Province.”

“In Bagh, three sounds disrupt silence in the valley, children playing, hammers and saws. Children are coming out of trauma, which is a great achievement. Food is being delivered. But 100 days into the process, survivors are desperately struggling for survival because of harsh winters. Eid was not a happy Eid. No animals were slaughtered. Survivors hardly visited their neighbours or invited others,” he said.

Through its ‘Operation Winter Race’, the UN agencies have managed, with close partnership of Pakistani military, to provide a good number of emergency shelters for vulnerable survivors in high mountain areas. “Our rapid assessment of needs after the first biting taste of winter suggested that we need to do more for people in these unplanned camps below the snow-line,” Mr Vandemoortele said.

He also called for greater vigilance regarding potential outbreak of cold-related sickness. “The cold weather is bringing with it a rise in the number of cases of acute respiratory diseases, specially in young and elderly. We have been able to avoid severe outbreaks. But we must remain vigilant to detect cases early and prevent any single case developing into an epidemic,” he said.

There were currently some 26 planned camps being run by Pakistan military with assistance and provisions from UN agencies and other donor organizations.

Safe water supplies had been provided to more than 95 per cent of people in these organized camps by the Water and Sanitation Cluster led by Unicef.

Another 118 unplanned camps had come up all over the earthquake affected areas. It was estimated that a total number of 200,000 people in these two types of camps were in urgent need of continuous relief assistance.

Contingency accommodation facilities had also been put in place to take care of upto 60,000 survivors who might choose to descend from higher mountain areas into camps below snow-line.

“We need to maintain the momentum with our relief operations as the weather allowed and we must remain united and vigilant to respond to every challenge,” the humanitarian coordinator said.

Unicef Representative Omar Abdi said: “Many risks to children have been averted through collaborative efforts of aid agencies with Pakistan government, military, NGO’s and civil society help. No major outbreak of water-borne communicable disease has occurred. Regrettable child deaths as a result of disease or accident are a sad fact however, and vigilance is critical to contain further occurrences.”

“The greatest challenge now is to protect an estimated 1.6 million earthquake affected children from bitter cold and threat of related diseases such as ARI and pneumonia. As a result, Unicef appealed to the world of the urgency for warm clothing and blankets. The results have been phenomenal,” Mr Abdi said.

He said tasks ahead were to protect and ensure survival and recovery of children. Maintaining large scale effort on clean water and sanitation provision and increasing impact of hygiene education measures to avoid communicable diseases were vital. Continuing large scale immunisation programme and strengthening routine immunisation were necessary and vigilance in relation to accidents, particularly fires and getting children back to schools.

Sharing facts, WFP’s Philip Clarke said: “WFP has distributed nearly 42,000 tons of food. WFP-conducted Inter- Agency Joint Rapid Food and Nutrition Assessment indicated that 2.3 million survivors needed food assistance.”

“We have all the food. Getting it upto people located high in mountains was expensive and in the process $1 million are being spent on one helicopter a month alone. Funding is improving. Emergency Operation has received 75 per cent of $59 million asked for.”

UN has received 54 per cent of $100 million in assistance in kind. WFP Logistics support operation received $15,800 and UN Joint Logistics Centre received $2.8 million. It is funded to 80 per cent, he said.

The speakers appealed to the entire international community to maintain the momentum as the hardest work was ahead, especially when winter snow thawed and people began to return home to rebuild their lives.