UNITED NATONS, Oct 18: Saying that ‘the race against time is growing shorter and shorter as the weather closes in’, a top UN official said on Monday that winter’s freezing temperatures are posing new challenges for relief workers delivering life-saving supplies to remote communities devastated by the recent earthquake in Pakistan.

“International aid efforts are facing really daunting logistical problems in delivering assistance to those in need,” said Kevin Kennedy, the Director for Coordination and Response for the Office of Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

Because of the approaching winter, the priorities are now shelter, health and food, and gaining access to remote areas, he said.

Some 3.3 million people are estimated to be rendered homeless, 38,000 dead, and 60,000 injured, he said, while cautioning that those figures could rise sharply once the UN gains access to all the remote areas affected by the October 8 disaster.

About one million people are expected to be ‘severely affected’, dependent solely on outside assistance for survival, so relief operations are still very much ‘at the life-saving stage at this point’, he added.

There are areas above Muzaffarabad that have not yet been accessed and as temperature dips to freezing point, the risk of hypothermia for people there increases.

“So far, just 20,000 of the 300,000 tents needed have been delivered. An additional 150,000 tents are en route and 100,000 have been pledged, but many of those are not winterized and will have to be altered,” Mr Kennedy said. About 12,000 patients have been evacuated so far but large areas remain unvisited, and sanitation problems persist.