“Worse than Tsunami”
October 20th, 2005
That’s what the U.N. is saying about the earthquake in Pakistan:
The United Nations said yesterday the earthquake in Pakistan was a worse disaster than last year’s tsunami, as its secretary general, Kofi Annan, warned of a second “massive wave of deaths” if international aid were not dramatically scaled up. “This is a huge, huge disaster … perhaps the biggest ever that we have seen. It is a race against time to save the lives of these people,” Mr Annan said in New York.
Unfortunately, due to donor fatigue from the Tsunami and from Hurricane Katrina, the dollars aren’t pouring in at the rate they’re needed.
It’s easy for us to be cynical. I’m the first to admit it. Because of my line of work, often my first reaction to an emergency isn’t “how awful” but “looks like we’re going into emergency mode at work and not sleeping for a week”. Not very compassionate, true, but part of the job.
Still, it’s hard for anyone to look at the numbers and not react. Last week, when we sent out the emergency mailings for our clients, we were using the number of 40,000 as the death toll. Today it’s up to 79,000. And it could still go higher. The numbers are absolutely staggering.
Please, if you have the means, make a donation to the aid effort. It doesn’t take much and it can really help.
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