Pakistan floods: Protest breaks out against administration after 6-year-old dies of starvation

Around 200 floodaffected families protested in Sukkur city of Sindh province after a sixyearold girl reportedly died of starvation and illness at a makeshift shelter near a filling station on the National Highway in the Patni area on FridayAccording to the Dawn Protestors said that the girl died as the Rohri mukhtiarkar officials failed to provide them food and other relief goods in timeThey said that they had been waiting for official aid since they had reached Sukkur from Jacobabad district after the torrential destroyed everything they hadThe officials came only to collect data but neither of them sent any relief items such as food tents mosquito nets and other necessary goods so that we could feed our starving children and protect their families against diseases the protestors saidThe protestors also told that no medical team had visited them to check on their children and women who were suffering from various diseases after the rainsWhen our children started starving we went to the mukhtiarkars office in Rohri for aid but we received neither food nor tents In the meanwhile my sixyearold daughter Razia died of starvation and disease said the girls father Khalid KhosoAlso Read UN chief Guterres visits flood ravaged areas in PakistanWhen the news about the girls death spread local people and former members of Khoso Ittihad Farman Khoso helped the family in the burial and provided ration bags to all the rainstricken families said the protestersTalking to media persons Farman Khoso appealed to the district administration to take care of the helpless rainhit families and provide them food immediately so that no more children died from starvation Dawn reportedLocals said that the Sukkur bench of the Sindh High Court had directed officials of the administration to accommodate the rainhit people in camps and provide them relief itemsThe death of the child was gross negligence on the officials part and their indifference to the court directives for the protection of rainhit people they saidRecord monsoon and heavy floods in Pakistan have given rise to hunger and various illnesses which have affected 33 million people and the experts believe that the situation would aggravate in the coming days as the flood affectees are forced to live under the sky depriving the required resourcesAccording to the Secretary general of Pakistan Medical AssociationKarachi Abdul Ghafoor Shoro one of the major challenges currently being faced in the disaster areas is lack of shelterPeople living under the open sky are forced to drink contaminated water They are getting a little bit of food either from nonprofit organisations or some kindhearted landlords This has increased the risk of disease outbreaks Several diseases including skin infections have been reported in the countryAccording to the latest JulySeptember health department data skin ailments and diarrhoeal diseases are rampant in floodaffected areas A total of 149551 people have been reported with diarrheal diseases while 142739 people reported skin infectionsThe official statistics recorded 132485 cases of acute respiratory disease 49420 cases of suspected malaria 101 cases of snakebite and 550 cases of a dog bite There were 185274 cases of other illnessesAccording to officials over 15000 cases of skin infection cases around 14000 cases of diarrhoeal diseases and more than 13000 cases of acute respiratory illnesses are being reported daily at governmentrun medical campsIn the wake of severe floods the initially estimated losses have accumulated in the range of USD 18 billion Pakistans agriculture sector faces the worst blow as the agriculture growth might remain zero or slide into negative against the envisaged target of 39 per cent for the current financial year 202223The catastrophic floods displaced more than 33 million people and are estimated to have caused USD 30 billion of damageWorld Health Organisation WHO has also warned about the worsening crisis in the country ravaged by the record rainsWe are following closely and with deep concern the humanitarian crisis currently facing the people of Pakistan as a result of devastating monsoon floods said Dr Ahmed AlMandhari WHO Regional Director for the Eastern Mediterranean on the floods in PakistanAccording to the World Meteorological Organization WMO Pakistan is facing one of the worst flooding events in its historyThe government estimates that millions across the country are affected by the rains floods and impacts such as landslides destroying infrastructure homes agricultural land and livestockThe calamitous floods have so far claimed at least 1325 people in PakistanThe human and socioeconomic toll is expected to increase as flood levels continue to rise with immense pressure on the countrys damsThe Pakistan Meteorological Department said that it was the wettest August since records began in 1961 National rainfall was 243 per cent above average In the province of Balochistan it was 590 per cent and in Sindh 726 per cent according to the monthly reportThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever