PAKISTAN - Assessment Mission Underway
- An IOM team has today left Islamabad for Muzaffarabad and other parts of earthquake-affected Pakistan to begin an assessment of the emergency shelter needs of earthquake victims.
The team will first assess needs in Muzaffarabad, before going to Balakot and Mansehra, where emergency shelter needs are reported to be desperate. The team will also try to reach other towns if road conditions permit. However, bad road and weather conditions are already hampering their mission.
IOM has also sent six trucks carrying 500 mattresses and 6,300 blankets today to the towns of Rawalakot, Bagh and Dhir Kot as earthquake victims face freezing temperatures, rain or snowfall. British non-governmental organization (NGO) Islamic Relief, will distribute the relief items in the towns.
With an estimated 2,000 villages and more than 2.7 million people affected by the earthquake, the rapid provision of emergency shelter has become essential as winter conditions begin setting in. Emergency shelter is also critically needed for treated patients in field and overflowing fixed hospitals as more and more injured people are brought in for treatment.
Meanwhile, as IOM gears up to begin medical evacuations of wounded people, it is providing emergency medical supplies for the children's hospital at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences in Islamabad.
Although donor pledges in response to an IOM appeal last week for $US 20 million for its operations in Pakistan are beginning to come in, more funds are urgently needed to ensure emergency shelter provisions, in particular, are rapidly met. IOM's appeal focuses on emergency shelter, medical evacuations and health-related activities and the provision of surface transport.
For further information, please contact Jemini Pandya, IOM Geneva, Tel: + 41 79 217 3374