Source: The Hindu
THE MONETARY CRISIS AND CALL FOR HELP
After weeks of record floods in Pakistan due to climate change , the United Nations increased its humanitarian aid appeal for Pakistan by five times, to $816 million from $160 million. This is because a rise in water-borne infections and concern about growing hunger pose new threats.
The amount of money needed by Pakistan to recover from the most recent devastating floods has increased five-fold, according to the country’s climate change minister, who on Tuesday pleaded for immediate assistance from outside at the launch of a U.N. humanitarian appeal.
Sherry Rehman, the minister in charge of combating climate change, said during a meeting in Geneva to raise money for Pakistan that “we have no space to offer our economy any stimulation.” She claimed that more than 7 million people have been uprooted from their homes.
She pleaded with the industrialised world to speed up funds for the unfolding domestic calamity connected to climate change, which she claimed had never been matched in recorded history.
Large portions of the South Asian nation have been swamped by the floods, which were brought on by unusual monsoon rains and glacial melt. The majority of those murdered were women and children, numbering close to 1,700.
Ayaz Sadiq, Pakistan’s minister of economic affairs, told the crowd that it would take “years and years” for Pakistan to rebuild and assist in the rehabilitation of millions of individuals whose homes had been damaged by the water.
Source: Reuters
URGENT NEED FOR MEDICINE
Amidst stagnant floodwaters that, according to officials, will take several months to recede, hundreds of thousands of displaced people who are living outside are being exposed to diseases like malaria, diarrhoea, dengue fever, and severe skin and eye infections. These illnesses are all quickly spreading. The calamity has been attributed to climate change by the government and the UN.
Pakistan was “on the verge of a public health crisis,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general of the World Health Organization.
33 million out of 220 million people have been affected by the flood, and it has destroyed crops, roads, animals, bridges, residences, schools, and medical facilities, causing damage the government estimates to be $30 billion.
Rehman claimed that 8.2 million people in Pakistan urgently needed treatment and that additional food supplies would need to be imported because the nation’s export crops had been destroyed by flooding.
The $816 million goal for the appeal, according to Julien Harneis, the U.N. resident coordinator and humanitarian coordinator in Pakistan, is “simply not enough.” He added that only $90 million of the earlier $160 million UN appeal had been received, saying “We need all of these funds and we need them immediately.”
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