It is over a month since floods initially ravaged Pakistan’s northwest region, and aid workers on the ground believe that the crisis will “get worse before it gets better.”
Almost 50% of the affected population – 17 million – have still not been reached since both urban and rural areas in the region were flooded by water from the excessively heavy monsoon rains, and their circumstances are continuing to deteriorate.
Unsafe water and generally unsanitary conditions are resulting in outbreaks of diarrhea and raising concerns about cholera. The World Health Organization said on Tuesday that more than 500,000 cases of acute diarrhea and nearly 95,000 cases of suspected malaria have been treated since the floods first hit.
Other problems include young children, who are forced to wear the same muddy clothes for days on end are developing skin diseases, and many people are unable to bury their dead properly because there is simply not enough dry land on which to intern them.
"What we hear from the people living in the camps is that they are hanging on, surviving on what little food and water they receive, wearing the clothes they escaped the floods in, and trying to keep their children and livestock alive," said Mike Bailey, regional advocacy manager for Christian relief group World Vision. "The truth is that, despite of the amount of aid that has already been provided in some places, many people are in worse shape now than they were two weeks ago."
In their report World Vision said that entry into the worst-hit areas remains one of the chief obstacles in providing appropriate relief in this disaster. Many towns, such as those in Punjab, are still unapproachable over a month after the flooding began due to significant damage to transport systems such as roads and bridges. Communication networks have also been affected so further increasing the difficulties in providing sufficient aid.
Although the relief work has been a joint effort between the United Nations, the Pakistani army and a host of local and international relief groups, their combined resources have so far proved insufficient to provide medicine, food and water to the worst affected regions,. It is estimated that there are about eight million people who are in need of emergency assistance that cannot be reached.
"It's still difficult to assess the full extent of the damage, but we know that children and families are still in desperate need of the most basic things like food, clean water, and shelter," said Bailey. "Even when we focus on providing the most urgently-needed relief supplies, we've still been able to reach just one-tenth of the people we're trying to help in the next three months."
The World Food Program has said that at least 40 heavy helicopters are needed to assist. The United States has promised to provide a further 18 helicopters to work alongside the 15 already working in the region.
However, aid agencies are still struggling to raise the funds needed to properly assist those stricken by this massive humanitarian crisis. Only about two-thirds of the $460 million the U.N. requested for emergency aid has been raised, according to the head of the World Food Program. But the food agency itself has less than half the money it needs to feed those affected.
The scale of the disaster has raised concerns about the stability of nuclear-armed Pakistan, which is already reeling from al-Qaida and Taliban violence and massive economic woes.