segunda-feira, 16 de agosto de 2010

Health fears rife in flood camps


Sukkur, Pakistan (CNN) -- Little Sabia Mirani's body resembles a skeleton compared to other children her age. The tiny one-year-old is perched on her father's knee fishing out the last few bits of puffed rice in a small plastic bowl.
Her arms and legs are stick thin. Her slender neck doesn't seem like it can hold up her large head. She is one of the estimated 20 million people affected by the worst floods in Pakistan's history.
Sabia has had health issues since she was born and since the floods she has been getting weaker by the day.
Her father, Amir Mirani prays nothing will happen to her but there is little clean water to drink and she has a bad case of diarrhea. For a child in her condition diarrhea can be deadly.
Up to 3.5 million children are at risk of contracting water-borne diseases, according to said Maurizio Giuliano from the U.N.'s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
Mirani, a laborer has six children, and his wife is pregnant with his seventh. They lost everything in the floods except a handful of things piled up on the windowsill behind them.
They, along with dozens of other large families, are huddled together in what was a high school classroom. It has been turned into a free clinic.
The makeshift clinic is dark, dingy, and stifling due to the humidity and heat. CNN