Myanmar Cyclone Brings Disease Worries

Photo Caption: A small temple is seen submerged in a flooded rice field near a house destroyed by last weekend's devastating cyclone near Yangon, Myanmar, Thursday, May 8, 2008. The U.N.'s World Food Program says its first flight carrying aid has landed in Myanmar after the military regime gave clearance to send relief material to cyclone victims. (AP Photo)

HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — Reports of malaria outbreaks and diarrhea in Myanmar's low-lying areas hardest hit by a disastrous cyclone have health experts scrambling to prevent widespread illness, U.N. health officials said Thursday.

An early estimate had 20 percent of children suffering from diarrhea in the worst-affected areas, and there are concerns that the situation could worsen, said Osamu Kunii, UNICEF's chief of health and nutrition in Yangon.

"Most of the area is covered by dirty water," he said. "There's a lot of dead bodies, and (survivors) have very poor access — sometimes no access — to clean drinking water or food."

Water purification tablets often do not help because much of the water supply has been contaminated by saltwater that flooded the area, he said, and that poses yet another problem for relief efforts.

It was unclear how many people may be suffering from malaria, but the mosquito-borne disease is endemic to the Irrawaddy delta, the area hardest hit by the storm, said Poonam Khetrapal Singh, deputy director of the WHO's Southeast Asia office in New Delhi. She said 10,000 mosquito nets were being sent to the area.

There also have been reports of upper respiratory infections among children.

"Safe water, sanitation, safe food. These are things that we feel are priorities at the moment," Singh said.

A WHO team from the Myanmar office is working to assess the situation, and a few international technical experts are making their way into the country, Singh said.

Cyclone Nargis lashed the country's largest city, Yangon, along with its major rice-growing region this past weekend. Myanmar's state-run media has reported nearly 23,000 deaths and more than 42,000 missing. But a top U.S. diplomat has said the death toll could surpass 100,000.

"It reminds me of the tsunami, when every day the figures kept rising, and that's really the pattern here," Singh said, referring to the 2004 Asian tsunami, which killed nearly 230,000 people.

UNICEF's Kunii also responded to some of the worst tsunami-hit areas, and he said the situation in Myanmar is even worse in some ways because many more people suffered severe injuries this time from the strong winds, high tides and flooding.

He also noted that after the tsunami, food, water and other basic necessities were much easier to access from inland areas that were not hit by the killer waves.

"This time, it is quite difficult because most of the areas are quite remote and difficult to access," he said. "We are trying our best. We are using all our medical supplies and water purification and shelters."

He said many people are scared about getting infections from the bloated bodies strewn throughout the area, but there have been no reports of infections linked to contact with corpses.

Tens of thousands of people die every year in Myanmar from widespread illnesses such as tuberculosis, AIDS and diarrhea. Malaria alone kills about 3,000 people annually, and children are often most vulnerable.

In 2000, the WHO ranked the military-run country's health system as the world's worst after war-ravaged Sierra Leone. Hospitals exist in Myanmar, also known as Burma, but most cannot afford treatment in a country where an estimated 90 percent of the population lives on just US$1 (euro0.65) a day, millions go hungry and about one in three children is malnourished.

Myanmar has been under military rule since 1962 and the junta has been widely criticized for large-scale human rights abuses and suppression of pro-democracy parties. In September the military crushed peaceful protests led by Buddhist monks and pro-democracy activists, killing at least 31 people and leading to the arrest of thousands more.

-- Margie Mason, AP Medical Writer

Margie Mason covers medical issues for The Associated Press across the Asia-Pacific. She is based in Hanoi, Vietnam.

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Image Credit: AP Photo