By Sarah Ahmed | Project Leader
Pakistan has fertile soil, four seasons, mountains, rivers, glaciers and beautiful people. This beautiful country is now the worst victim of climate change despite only emitting 1% of the global greenhouse gases.
This year it rained 500% more since the last 30 years, piled miseries in 90 districts of Pakistan and directly affected 33 million people. These massive rains have hit areas with the highest poverty rates in the country, washing away entire houses, agricultural lands, roads, and bridges. The UNHCR said an estimated 16 million children had been affected, and at least 3.4 million girls and boys remain in need of immediate lifesaving support.
According to the most recent data/reports of N.D.M.A. (National Disaster Management Authority of Pakistan), published on 3rd November 2022, the massive floods in Pakistan have claimed 1739 lives, (including 647 children and 353 women), and 13,000 people are seriously injured.
Pakistan has already been facing a severe economic crisis, and these floods have worsened the situation. Ours is an agricultural country, and these floods have severely damaged agricultural lands and crops.
Disease and Epidemic
The stagnant water around has given rise to an outburst of disease. This water provides the perfect optimum conditions for the growth of mosquitos and flies; hence, dengue and malaria have turned into an epidemic. The people are sleeping in the open on elevated highways. Malnourishment and weekend immunity has made people, especially children, prone to disease. Worse living conditions, unpredictable weather, loss of hygiene, unavailability of clean drinking water and toilets and a total loss of primary healthcare infrastructure have worsened the situation. The local populations suffer from skin and eye infections, diarrhoea, malaria and dengue fever. The most affected are the children and their mothers.
NGOs are the ones trying to sail the ship and save lives. Al-Mustafa Disaster Relief Teams have been on-ground since the situation's start and have provided relief to 1.75 million flood victims.
The first and foremost priority of Al-Mustafa was rescue and relief activities. We focused on saving the lives of both, i-e. The wounded ones and the diseased ones. The infrastructure was destroyed, and medical facilities were scarce.
Officials of Al-Mustafa circulated special appeals and messages to approach our network of donors and volunteers, especially the ones related to the healthcare profession. Thousands of doctors, nurses and paramedical staff joined us to form Medical Aid Teams.
Strategy and Planning
Al-Mustafa's strategy-making team were focused on collecting data from our rescue and relief teams, local volunteers and administration. On the basis of this data, the strategists assessed the situation and sent different Medical Aid Teams to different zones. The pre-assessment of the ground made it easy for us to equip our teams with the right amount of medicines, equipment and other consumables.
Medical Aid
The medical aid teams consist of doctors, paramedical staff and support workers. Our units are equipped with medicines, ambulance, oxygen, nebulization and other emergency relief equipment. We set up medical camps in disaster-afflicted areas and provide on-the-spot treatment and medication for emergencies and routine medical conditions. Patients who need further treatment are referred to Al-Mustafa's hospitals or other available healthcare facilities. Al-Mustafa's medical teams have provided medical aid to 0.5 million flood victims.
Shortage of Basic and Advanced Lifesaving Medicines
Another big issue that arose was the shortage of medicines from the market. Due to the magnitude of destruction, these floods have caused and the rise of different epidemics in the flood-afflicted and non-afflicted areas, different essential drugs (such as simple pain-killer paracetamol/acetaminophen) and other drugs, such as antimalarials, certain antibiotics and consumables became scarce and started disappearing from the market, and the available stock became too expensive.
The team of Al-Mustafa Pharmacy came to the rescue; our pharmacists and supply chain officers made sure that the required drugs were purchased at low cost by contacting different pharmaceutical manufacturers and suppliers at the right time. They also collected thousands of physician's sample packs and availed medicines on subsidized rates and on a free-of-cost basis from pharmaceutical manufacturers and suppliers. The team of Pharmacists also sorted and packed drugs for each camp cording to the expected number of patients, doses and disease expectancy on the basis of the data provided by the strategy and planning team.
Locations
Our teams are working in the following highly afflicted districts of Pakistan:
We will continue to send you more updates of Al-Mustafa Flood Relief Operations in the coming days.
By Khurram Qasmi | Project Contributor
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