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Officials say death toll now over 7,200 across entire quake zone
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At least 5,894 people have died in Turkey while 2,032 have died in Syria; WHO officials warn the total could be as high as 20,000
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5,775 buildings confirmed to have collapsed
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Difficult conditions frustrate rescue efforts as toll reaches raises
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23m people including 1.4m children likely affected
ANKARA – The death toll from the massive earthquakes that hit southern Turkey and northern Syria soared above 7,200 by Tuesday – and was still expected to rise as rescuers continued digging into buildings flattened by the temblors.
Turkey’s emergency management agency said the total number of deaths in the country had passed 5,400, with some 31,000 people injured.
In Syria, the quake-affected area is divided between government-held territory and the country’s last opposition-held enclave, which is surrounded by government forces and borders Turkey.
The death toll in government-held areas of Syria climbed over 800, with some 1,500 injured, according to the Health Ministry. At least 1,000 people had died in the rebel-held northwest, according to the White Helmets, the emergency organization leading rescue operations, with more than 2,400 injured.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said 13 million of the country’s 85 million people were affected, and he declared a state of emergency in 10 provinces.
For the entire earthquake-hit area, that number could be as high as 23 million people, according to Adelheid Marschang, a senior emergencies officer with the World Health Organization.
World Health Organisation – WHO Senior Emergency Officer, Adelheid Marschang revealed on Tuesday that an estimated 23 million people – including 1.4 million children, were likely exposed in both – Turkey and Syria – following the earthquake and its aftershocks that reduced thousands of buildings to rubble.
Dozens of powerful aftershocks continued to jolt southern Turkey and northern Syria on Tuesday, a day after an earthquake struck the region killing more than 5,000 people and destroying thousands of buildings, as difficult conditions, freezing temperatures as damaged roads hampered rescue efforts.
As the scale of the devastation from the 7.8 magnitude tremor continued to unfold, the WHO warned the number of casualties could exceed 20,000.
On Tuesday morning, Turkey’s vice-president, Fuat Oktay, said 3,419 people had been killed in the quake, with another 20,534 had been injured. The number of confirmed deaths on the Syrian side of the border rose to 1,602, bringing the death toll in both countries to 5,021.
Turkey’s disaster management agency said it had 11,342 reports of collapsed buildings, of which 5,775 had been confirmed.
People in remote towns in southern Turkey described how relief efforts were stretched to breaking point, amid destruction over a border region spanning almost 650 miles.
In rebel-held northern Syria, volunteer rescue workers said they lacked some of the most basic fuel and other provisions required to pull those still trapped under the rubble of their homes.
An unknown number of people remain trapped and efforts to find survivors have been frustrated by frigid conditions. Poor internet connections and damaged roads between some of the worst-hit cities in Turkey’s south, home to millions of people, also hindered rescue teams.
Marschang said Turkey had a strong capacity to respond to the crisis but that the main unmet needs in the immediate and midterm would be across the border in Syria, already grappling with a years-long humanitarian crisis due to the civil war and a cholera outbreak.
“This is a crisis on top of multiple crises in the affected region she said at the organization’s board meeting in Geneva,” she said. “All over Syria, the needs are the highest after nearly 12 years of protracted, complex crisis, while humanitarian funding continues to decline.”
WHO said it was dispatching emergency supplies, including trauma and emergency surgical kits, and activating a network of emergency medical teams.
“It’s now a race against time,” said WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. “Every minute, every hour that passes, the chances of finding survivors alive diminishes.
He said the WHO was especially concerned about areas of Turkey and Syria where no information had emerged since Monday’s earthquake.
“Damage mapping is one way to understand where we need to focus our attention,” he said.
- Agencies
