Almost 100 million people populate the islands of the Philippines in the western Pacific Ocean, according to World Bank estimates, and millions living in coastal areas have been affected by the initial destruction and continuing aftermath produced by the super-typhoon, which delivered:
- Torrential rain
- Winds of over 185mph, and
- A storm surge wave of up to 30 feet.
Aid agencies say they have learnt a lot from previous natural disasters - the 2010 earthquake in Haiti included - making them better prepared to provide the most effective response. But what are the medical needs and how exactly are they met?
Medical boats and inflatable hospitals
According to a World Health Organization (WHO) report on November 10th, the Philippine Red Cross had estimated that over 1,200 people were killed - but as the picture developed, a November 27th report from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) put that figure at an estimate of 5,200 deaths and nearly 26,000 injuries.
The destruction caused by super-typhoon Haiyan is said to be on a scale similar to that brought by the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami in the Indian Ocean
The obvious initial emergency has been to treat the wounded and deliver shelter and clean food and water, but there was also the need to reach those people who were already receiving medical attention before the disaster, or who were due to give birth.
Immediate responses, before international agencies can reach the people affected, come from the local people and governments, and charities first work with local efforts to coordinate action.
The Philippines itself - where the 2013 disaster is called Typhon Yolanda - has its own coordinated medical response, including "Doctors on Boats" provided by the Philippine Medical Association, which is calling for donations.
Doctors on Boats is accustomed to delivering medical staff and medicines in similar emergency situations in the Philippines, such as the monsoon floods in August 2012.
It has provided over 100 volunteer doctors, nurses, dentists, pharmacists and psychologists. As international aid then follows in affected areas, measures include setting up inflatable hospitals. Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières), for example, is providing help in an inflatable hospital that it first deployed during the Haitian earthquake crisis in 2010, shown in the charity's YouTube video below.
Doctors Without Borders has an update on its overall Philippines response, which has also included the use of traditional tent hospitals.
After trying to meet the immediate needs, other health threats can develop - but it is a myth to think that one of these is the presence of dead bodies.
Dead bodies are not a major health threat
As confirmed in a fact sheet from the World Health Organization (WHO) about care of the dead in disasters, dead bodies are not the main source of disease and are not responsible for the initial public health threat.Of course, the widespread sight of dead bodies is highly distressing, and TV journalists tend to refer graphically to the smell of death, but it is a myth that burial should be a priority.
Diseases and infections are not started in rotting bodies that have been killed by the immediate disaster trauma. In fact, survivors are the source of infection, as their own sanitary conditions deteriorate and sources of clean water are disrupted.Dead bodies only present gastrointestinal infection problems, WHO says, sometimes caused if they contaminate water supplies.
The greater priority for removal of dead bodies is to reduce social and mental distress, but guidance reminds communities affected that there is no need to rush to bury or cremate people, and that time is important for proper identification to take place.
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