Over 1,100 people, including 380 children, have died in Pakistan as a result of torrential rains and flooding. As the UN made an appeal for $160 million in help on Tuesday, army helicopters rescued stranded families and dropped food supplies in inaccessible areas.
33 million people have been affected by the unprecedented flood, which was brought on by extremely strong monsoon rains. Homes, companies, infrastructure, and crops have all been destroyed.
In the three months from July through August of this year, the nation received 390.7 millimetres more rain than the 30-year normal. The 50 million-person Sindh province was hardest hit, receiving 466% more rain than the 30-year normal.
The disaster’s scope was described to the media by Sherry Rehman, Minister of Climate Change, as “one third of the country is practically under water.”
At a press conference held at his office in Islamabad, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif informed media that at least 380 children were among the victims.
In a video message, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres declared that Pakistan was “awash in suffering” as the organisation began an appeal for $160 million to aid the South Asian country. “The Pakistani people are dealing with the persistent effects of epochal levels of rain and flooding,” said one observer.
According to a U.N. official, Guterres would visit Pakistan the next week to observe the consequences of the “extraordinary climate calamity.”
He claimed that the severity of the climate calamity required the attention of the entire world.
In addition to moving more than 50,000 people to two government shelters in the northwest, a state-run disaster management agency reported that almost 300 stranded individuals, including some tourists, were flown in northern Pakistan on Tuesday.
Hussain Sadiq, a 63-year-old villager who was staying at one of the shelters with his parents and five children, told the media that life there was “extremely hard,” adding that his family had “lost everything.”
According to Hussain, the facility frequently saw cases of fever and diarrhoea as well as inadequate medical care.
General Qamar Javed Bajwa, the head of the Pakistani army, visited the northern Swat Valley to monitor rescue and relief efforts and noted that “restoration will take a long, long time.”
In a statement, the American embassy in Islamabad announced that the government would donate $30 million to USAID to help Pakistan deal with the floods. It added that it was “truly grieved by the catastrophic loss of lives, livelihoods, and homes throughout Pakistan.”
The government stated that early estimates put the cost of the flood damage at more than $10 billion and that the international community had a duty to assist Pakistan in adjusting to the impacts of climate change.
The prime minister predicted that the losses will likely be far larger.
Flash floods that came crashing down from northern highlands as a result of torrential rain destroyed bridges, buildings, and crops.
Flooding is occurring along the Indus river’s length as enormous amounts of water are being dumped into it from the country’s northern highlands to its southern plains.
Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, Pakistan’s foreign minister, said that hundreds of thousands of people were living outside without access to basic necessities like food, clean water, shelter, or healthcare.
33 million people, or more than 15% of Pakistan’s 220 million people, are estimated to have been impacted by the floods.
The $160 million that Guterres intended to raise through the appeal would give 5.2 million people access to food, water, sanitation, emergency education, and health care.
Sharif promised that “every penny will reach the needy, there will be no waste at all” and that the amount of charity would need to “be multiplied swiftly.”
Sharif was concerned that the destruction would further undermine an already unstable economy, possibly causing a severe food scarcity and escalating inflation, which was 24.9% in July.
He added that postponing wheat sowing might also have an adverse effect, but Pakistan and Russia were actively discussing wheat imports as a way to lessen it.
The head of the national disaster agency, General Akhtar Nawaz, stated that at least 72 of Pakistan’s 160 districts have been deemed catastrophe-hit.
He claimed that flooding affected more than two million acres of agricultural land.
Pakistan, according to Bhutto-Zardari, has turned into the epicentre of global warming.
As long as there are strong rains over places that have already been flooded and battered by storms for more than two months, the situation is certain to get worse, he said.
Guterres urged the international community to act quickly in response to Pakistan’s request for assistance and urged an end to “sleepwalking towards the devastation of our planet by climate change.”
