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U.N.: Tsunami Aid Wards Off Disease Threat

Posted on: Thursday, 6 January 2005, 09:00 CST

GENEVA -- The threat of an outbreak of waterborne diseases in areas affected by the Indian Ocean disaster is receding, largely because of the amount of medical aid flooding into the region, the United Nations said Thursday.

The huge amount of aid going into the region is having a "positive impact" and bottlenecks are starting to clear up, allowing relief agencies to get supplies to many of the people who need them most, said Jamie McGoldrick, an official of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

"I think that it's been very clear that we rang the alarm bells to say that this is going to be an issue," McGoldrick told The Associated Press. "I think that made people focus very quickly on health and waterborne diseases."

The early U.N. focus on the threat of cholera, typhoid and dysentery has helped to prevent a major disease outbreak, even though the incidence of diarrhea has increased in many of the affected areas, McGoldrick said.

"The result of that is we averted a major water crisis, or a water disease crisis," he added.

He said it meant the United Nations hadn't needed to implement its plan to combat an outbreak of waterborne diseases in the region.

However, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan warned at a meeting in Jakarta on Thursday the danger remains, saying that the 150,000 death toll may yet double because of outbreaks from unsanitary and crowded conditions in relief camps.

Source: Associated Press/AP Online

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