By Kevin McCort, CEO CARE Canada
DAY 1
Our flights were very full, which makes getting any sleep a real challenge. Given the fact we took two night flights to get here, staying awake and alert is a challenge today.
We were to fly the last leg of our journey today from Lahore to Islamabad but bad weather delayed the flight. Fortunately for us, CARE Pakistan staff were in Lahore visiting tent manufacturers, so we offloaded our bags from the plane and joined them on their rounds. We'll drive to Islamabad this afternoon.
Pakistan is probably the world's leading tent manufacturer, an item in high demand to help those made homeless by flooding. Problem is that every producer had sent all their stock to Haiti, and inventories here have not yet been rebuilt. So we are still looking of another week or more before production will be ramped up and major quantities start to be available.
DAY 2
Today started early. We were on the road at 7am to get into the flood affected areas in time to witness a distribution of non food items by our local partner (IDEA). CARE had purchased and sent tents and non food items to Nowshera as it was hard hit by the floods.
We arrived at their office shortly after 9am and found lots of staff busy assembling relief kits of tents, kitchen sets and hygiene kits. The targeting to the most needy had been done prior to the distribution. Once the distribution started, the head of the household presented a voucher, which certifies that they were selected as a recipient. They were then given the goods, and also provided transport to their home or refuge site. It was great to see the goods on hand and being given out, but I didn't know how much they were needed until I got into the neighborhoods.
I had seen the helicopter overview footage, which shows the macro picture, but walking the streets, entering peoples homes (what is left of them) tells the micro picture. And that story is of people who have lost everything. Entire neighborhoods had been submerged (10 to 12 feet of water). Walls collapsed, everything soaked and covered in mud, and garbage everywhere. Still a lot of standing water, and it is hot. We have given out tents so people have shelter, but the interiors were even hotter than outside. These can only be a temporary solution.
The list of what people have lost is great but they have kept their skills, willingness to cooperate, and sense of community. Our relief work is off to a great start but I also have a better sense of how big the challenge is. The additional money announced by CIDA today will help.
DAY 3
At the moment, in the upper Swat valley, the river is actually quite beautiful, a rough and rugged mountain river. Just a few days ago though it was a monster, and today we saw the destruction it caused in the towns and villages along its upper reaches.
Whole villages, riverside roads, bridges, power stations and the entire center of own town, are actually gone. Not flooded, or damaged, but totally gone. It wasn't easy to get in to see this damage either, since the roads were cut, we drove as far as we could, then grabbed our raingear and some water and started walking. After 20 minutes we found another stretch of road, so hired a driver to take us further. He could only go so far as the road was cut again further on, so we got out and walked again. We repeated this hopscotch process of walking then using stranded cars a few more times over the next couple of hours before we reached our destination of Maydan. It is in this town that one of the CARE supported medical clinics was operating.
It is also where some of the most extensive damage is found. The entire west side of the main street fell into the river and was washed away. A new channel was cut down another street, taking out the entire roadway and several storefronts. It also completely destroyed the office of our local partner, IDEA.
I didn't hear about any injuries during the flooding, but in my conversations with the male and female doctors in the clinic, they mentioned that many of the patients they saw today were traumatized by the floods. I can't imagine what it must have been like on that day.
The doctors also mentioned that diarrhea was an increasing problem, with many cases. An outbreak of diarrhea is my biggest fear, as this can be very dangerous, especially for children.
We are arranging to bring in extra supplies for the clinic to ensure they are well equipped to head off a possible outbreak. And until the road is fixed, we'll be hopscotching them in.
DAY 4
We left the flood zone earlier today, and are now in Islamabad. I already feel that I should be back there with those who have been so badly impacted. But in the reality of humanitarian response, we all have our jobs to do, and our local staff and partners don't actually need my help giving the next shipment of 2,600 tents to familieslike Ahmed, Faizla and their children, they don't need me underfoot when they are running our four medical clinics that are each serving 150 patients every day. What the flood victims and our staff need me to do is tell their stories, raise awareness and raise money. Our staff on the ground will ensure that aid is delivered to those who need it, they will ensure that our efforts are coordinated with local authorities and other agencies, and they will provide proof every day that the outside world is standing in solidarity with those so badly affected by these floods.
My biggest fear however is that the unfolding disaster is getting worse, and that my efforts at doing my job are inadequate. It is hard to believe that the floods and the stories I've been telling about those affected don't seem to be motivating donors the same way that the tsunami, or Haitian earthquake, did.
One of the first principles of humanitarian response is that assistance provided to survivors of a disaster must be equitable. To put that into perspective, Canadians donated $220 million dollars after the Haiti earthquake, addressing the relief, recovery and reconstruction needs of some three million Haitians. That is nearly $7 per Canadian, or over $70 per Haitian affected by the crisis (and this excludes money from CIDA). We are very far from that level of giving for Pakistan, and I don't know why. Our response is not equitable, and that troubles me a great deal.
My second fear is how I may have to answer the question "have you ever seen anything this bad before?" if we can't address my first fear above. On one level, I have never seen flooding this extensive, I have also never seem millions of people displaced over a two week period, and I have never seen 20% of a very large country affected by a single natural disaster. But on another level, I have seen worse. The cholera epidemic that struck the refugee camps in (then) Zaire after the genocide in Rwanda in 1994 were the result of the inability of the local authorities and the humanitarian community to provide clean water and adequate sanitation to the one million refugees who suddenly crossed the border. The death toll was horrific, with probably more than 50,000 people, mostly women and children, dying over a two week period as the epidemic ran unchecked through the refugee population. On the worst single day of that epidemic, we estimated between 5,000 to 10,000 people died.
I have seen the horrors of what an epidemic of water borne diseases can do to a displaced and vulnerable population. I'm going to do all I can to ensure that we prevent a catastrophic epidemic, so that when I am asked that question about the these Pakistan floods I don't have to say that "I have never seen anything this bad in my life".
So that is why I've left the flood zone - to do my job of raising awareness and raising funds to contribute to the relief effort. We can't undo the flooding, but we can still prevent the needless loss of life that will surely result if we fail to act now.