 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| . |  |
. |
Disasters hit 18 million people in Latin America in 2008: UN
Geneva (AFP) Dec 11, 2008 Natural disasters such as floods, hurricanes and droughts hit 18 million people in Latin America this year causing around 1,000 deaths and seven billion dollars' worth of damages, the UN said Thursday. The high number of floods across the region accounted for around 80 percent of all damages, while landslides caused between 60-70 percent of the deaths, said Douglas Reiner, regional disaster response adviser for the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). "A trend that we see and that's important to note across the region is this increase in flood affectation," he told journalists. "Droughts in our region have increased over the last 30 years some 300 percent, hurricanes fivefold and flooding almost 300 percent as well," he said. Disasters invariably hit the poorest and most vulnerable people in the region and states must do more to address social inequalities which exacerbate their impact, warned Gerard Gomez, head of OCHA's regional office for America and the Caribbean. "It's the region of the world with the greatest inequalities, it's where you have 75 percent of people concentrated in towns, it's where you have poor people who are totally invisible," Gomez said. OCHA is working with a variety of bodies including governments, civil society and the private sector to try to ensure that the populations are better prepared to cope with disasters and their aftermath, he added. Share This Article With Planet Earth
Related Links Bringing Order To A World Of Disasters A world of storm and tempest When the Earth Quakes
China's Pandas face winter food shortages: report
Shanghai (AFP) Dec 11, 2008Giant pandas living in China's southwest quake-ravaged Sichuan province face the risk of starvation this winter due to severe food shortages, state media reported Thursday. |
|
|
| The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2007 - SpaceDaily.AFP and UPI Wire Stories are copyright Agence France-Presse and United Press International. ESA Portal Reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement,agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by SpaceDaily on any Web page published or hosted by SpaceDaily. Privacy Statement |
del.icio.us
Digg
Reddit
YahooMyWeb
Google
Facebook