Emergencymedical supplies and food are still only trickling into Burma in the wake of Tropical Cyclone Nargis,which has left 1.5 million people in the worst-hit Irrawaddydelta in urgent need of humanitarian aid.
Amid mounting calls from abroad for the junta to permit a full-scale emergencyaid operation in Burma,U.N. spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs warned of “a second catastrophe” facing thehomeless, as disease and starvation began to take their toll on already stunned cyclone survivors.
As survivors run out of clean water for drinking and bathing and as food growsscarce, the Burmese people themselves are providing as much relief as theycan through donations, according to interviews with RFA’s Burmese service.
“The group went to Myaung-mya to donate a total of 300 rice bags, 20,000clothes, and an uncountable number of dried-noodle packets,” a worker with acharitable group in Rangoonsaid by telephone.
“They went to donate these things...We went to Kungyan-gone, Hlaing Thaya, andSouth Dagon,” said U Thuya, a prominent comedian also known as Zargana, referring to three districts in the former capital,Rangoon.
Trouble from authorities
But evenmeager donations from Burmaand overseas that did get through are running into problems with theauthorities, according to residents of Rangoon.
“We were told not to distribute uncooked rice. We’ve been harassed. So wedistributed cooked rice instead,” U Thuya added.
An eyewitness at a makeshift refugee camp in Bogalay township at the heart ofthe disaster said no one had seen any sign of foreign aid in the area—and authoritieshad ordered refugees to leave schools and monasteries by Wednesday, regardlesswhether they had homes to return to.
"In Thakayta and Kyauk-tan...people from the refugee camps were crying [afterbeing told] that by the 14th the victims will have to leave themonasteries and schools," the woman said. "That's for the entire country. That'sfor sure."
“In Bogalay township, there are a total of over 8,000 refugees. They are inmonasteries. There are 54 monasteries in the town of Bogalay,” she added.
She said refugees in Bogalay, who were desperate for clean water, had yetto receive any foreign aid at all.
“I saw only rice at the refugee camps. That was donated by private donors,” shesaid. “What we urgently need now is medicine to purify water. We can’t get thatin Burmaat all. So, if we go to Bogalay, we have to buy many water bottles. That’s aproblem for us. We urgently need that medicine to purify water.”
Vast aid needed
Accordingto U.N. disaster relief spokeswoman Byrs, Burma needs to import tens of thousands oftonnes of rice to feed the waves of internal refugees now sheltering inschools, monasteries, and other public buildings in cities in the south of thecountry, and around the former capital Rangoon.
So far, only 361 tonnes of food has been flown into the country by the WorldFood Programme (WFP), and only 175 tonnes of that has been distributed.
“We distributed cooked rice instead. Also we distributed raincoats. We donatedwarm clothes donated by [movie star] Ko Lwin Moe. The most effective thing wasdonating medicine—various medicines donated by [pharmacy company] Htet Lin. Wewere able to give them various medicines,” U Thuya said from Rangoon.
He said outbreaks of diarrhea and cholera were now common among refugees.
“Everyone has an upset stomach and many people are getting cholera—and somerashes. I don’t know what they are, but they have tiny bumps that are itchy,”he said.
“That’s on both adults and children. So we have started to donate medicine for thoseitchy bumps. Then I think the stomach problems are caused by the water. So weare donating water-purifying medicine,” he said, adding that the group would bejoined by 12 doctors who planned to test for cholera among refugee populations.
U.N. surveillance
A U.N.plane arrived in Rangoonon Monday, after several days of bureaucratic delays on the part of governmentofficials, with a cargo of food aid and medical supplies, including a DiarrhealDisease Kit, the World Health Organization (WHO) said in a statement.
The WHO said it had deployed 11 surveillance officers to affected townships inthe low-lying Irrawaddy delta, which was devastated by a 12-meter storm surgewhen Nargis made landfall in Burma.
A further five officers have been assigned to Rangoon district for the next two weeks toassess the situation and to deliver health relief items.
Burmese survivors and those trying to donate supplies to them have repeatedlycomplained that the quasi-government USDA group has appropriated supplies, preventingvolunteers from delivering food, water, and medicines directly to those whoneed them, saying they would take charge of distribution.
USDAdenotes the Union Solidarity DevelopmentAssociation, ostensibly a semi-official civic group comprising backers of thejunta. USDA members are routinely dispatched by the authorities to performvarious tasks.
U Thuyasaid: “Whenever we tried to donate uncooked rice, they started looting. So wecould no longer donate uncooked rice.”
“We now have to cook the rice and distribute it. If you take bags of rice, they’dloot from us. We don’t know who these people are. They’d just loot from us,” hesaid.
Zinc sheets given to junta
Anothersought-after commodity, zinc sheets for repairs to houses devastated by the storm,was also being monopolized by the military, a source close to the junta said.
A person close to high-ranking military families in the Air Force atMingaladon, Rangoon,said such families were being well looked after with large numbers of zincsheets being handed out free to those whose houses were destroyed.
"Only those houses that suffered a lot of damage got 10 sheets of zinc roofing.Those houses that were damaged slightly, losing four or five or 10 sheets, gotonly about two sheets. Even then they had to pay. One sheet of zinc is 4,000 kyat," the woman said.
U.N. health kits
WHO saidit had delivered another two Inter-Agency Emergency Health Kits to theworst-hit cities of Bogalay and Labutta.
It will sendfour more kits to Pyapon, Ngaputaw, Myaungmya, and Ma U Bin townships, wheretens of thousands of refugees, many of them with infections in untreatedinjuries, are sheltering in makeshift camps in schools and other publicbuildings with no little or no medical care.
Health officials have requested a list of the essential supplies and medicinesthat need to be replenished urgently. WHO said it would work with the healthministry to establish a revolving stock of drugs to ensure the continuingavailability of essential medicines and supplies.
Long-term trauma
Inaddition to their increasingly urgent physical needs, cyclone victims mustalso contend with extreme psychological trauma, which often hits the youngest victims hardest, according to U.S.-based trauma expertElizabeth Carll.
"For the children, it'svery difficult—especially if they're orphaned and have lost their family," saidCarll, a clinical psychologist in New York and author of TraumaPsychology: Issues in Violence, Disaster, Health and Illness.
“The long-term effectsare especially difficult for something like this kind of cyclone, because itimpacts not only on the individual family but the whole socio-economicstructure,” Carll said.
Involving victims of the 2004 Asian tsunami inrebuilding their communities helped alleviate trauma, shesaid, but poverty and deprivation will make that processlonger and more difficult in Burma.
Original reporting by RFA’s Burmese service andby Richard Finney. Translation by Than Than Win. Burmese service director:Nancy Shwe. Executive producer: Susan Lavery. Written and produced in Englishby Luisetta Mudie and Sarah Jackson-Han.