First Cholera victim passes away in Mozambique but hope remains.
Little remains from the destroyed homes and even recovering little things bring joy to the storm victims. Here 15-year-old Caelono Colote holds pages of his school books he was glad to find after the storm.
One week after Cyclone Idai devastated parts of Mozambique, the water supply system in Beira has been restored. International relief workers speed up their projects.
At last water is running again in the hard-hit city of Beira. The city of 1 million inhabitants is located centrally in Mozambique. Here the Pungwe river meets the Indian Ocean.
Re-installing water supply is a life-saving development for children and families still suffering from the storm.
“Restoring access to safe drinking water for Beira’s 500,000 inhabitants was a top priority. Without safe water, children are especially vulnerable to water borne diseases like diarrhoea, which can easily become life threatening.” (Chris Cormency, UNICEF’s water, sanitation and hygiene specialist)
Not all in the affected city have access to safe water. Today, the first victim died of Cholera while more than 570 Cholera cases are confirmed. Cholera is a disease that is hard to combat in a city that has only little clean running water.
Beira was left without electricity for days. Without electricity the pumps that supply water to the city did not work.
However, there is hope. UNICEF, UK aid and the Mozambican government are now working to repair water systems in other parts of the disaster-affected zone.
Water is now running again in many of the pipes, and a special water trucking operation is being run by the government until the damaged infrastructure can be repaired.
A lot of the infrastructure was destroyed during the cyclone. Most roads were damaged, bridges collapsed and power lines were destroyed during the heavy rain, flooding and strong winds.
Please support the relief efforts of UNICEF as more than 1 million children need your help to be able to go back to school and have safe places to learn and play.
Donations can be made via the UNICEF website here.
source: UNICEF
image: © UNICEF/Prinsloo