Three emergency teams are conducting relief operations in Abbottabad, Manshera and Shangla Districts in North West Frontier Province and in and around Muzzafarabad in Pakistan-administered Kashmir.
October 2005 - International Rescue Committee emergency teams are delivering emergency supplies, administering critical medical care and counseling services and beginning crucial water and sanitation assistance in underserved and hard-to-access villages and hamlets in quake-ravaged areas of Pakistan.
There is a rush against time to ensure the homeless have viable shelter before the onset of the region’s harsh winter. IRC experts were able to reach remote villages and hamlets in Abbottabad and Manshera Districts over the weekend where they found as many as 90% of dwellings and structures destroyed and many survivors with no protection from the elements.
In these and other quake-devastated villages, the IRC has been distributing tents, quilts and warm clothing and is procuring winterized tents, heavy tarps, lanterns and gas stoves for displaced families.
There is also concern about significant new population movements as people begin leaving disaster zones to try to access safer areas. The IRC is taking part in discussions with other agencies about longer-term shelter solutions.
The public health situation is dire, with scores of villages with little or no access to safe drinking water and functioning sanitation facilities. IRC emergency teams have provided clean water to thousands of displaced families and begin emergency latrine construction today.
Water distribution will continue in the short-term but the IRC plans to begin work shortly repairing existing water systems. Water treatment, filtration and pumping equipment are part of a $500,000 IRC shipment of emergency medical and public health supplies being loaded on planes for Pakistan.
Mobile health teams of physicians and paramedics have set up medical tent camps in Pakistani villages and are providing urgent treatment for patients. Most are suffering from fractures, infections, severe cough, colds, flu, and diarrhea.
Physicians are being flown in to bolster the health team already on the ground, including doctors and nurses from Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.
An IRC team of female counselors and psychosocial experts has been providing first aid and counseling to traumatized women and children. "In this setting, it's important that women are available to offer comfort, medical care and counseling to women survivors, as many would not seek out or receive assistance otherwise,” says the IRC’s Laila Khan.
"We're finding many women and children in a state of shock, completely overwhelmed by grief, particularly girls who have lost their mothers and mothers who have lost children. We've been organizing focus group discussions to encourage them to talk and start expressing their emotions. For mothers, this is the only way they'll be able to move on and be able to care for their surviving children."
The IRC has set up a distribution tent for women to make sure they receive supplies and is set to establish “child friendly spaces” aimed at creating structured healing and learning environments for children amid the chaos.
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