SAVE SINDH DEVELOPMENTAL ORGANIZATION

Impact of the floods WHO Report Feb 2011

Excessive Monsoon rains started on 21/22 July leading to flash floods and landslides from late July on. Early August, the worst impact was first concentrated in the North of the country but progressively moved down following the Indus River to affect the South.

Estimations of affected population were gradually increasing to reach more than 20 million in September, more than 10 % of the Pakistani population.

However, current estimations of directly and indirectly affected population is set at 18 Million (see table below)

The latest reports show still 150.000 flood displaced families in need of urgent humanitarian assistance mainly in Sindh and about 350.000 people still residing in camps.
•A total of 1.8 M households are estimated to be destroyed or damaged leading to the erection of thousands of makeshift camps.
• Many dikes, embankments and other infrastructure were destroyed (water channels, link roads, schools, health facilities and rural infrastructure). Access to safe drinking water was highly impeded and together with damage to sanitation infrastructure led to a high incidence of skin infections and water born diseases. Agricultural losses have been reported to be high for a population which is approximately 80% dependant for their livelihood on agriculture (damage to watering canals, loss of harvests and cropland, livestock, fisheries and forestry) (4)
• A total of 78 districts were affected initially but by early November, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) presented during the launch of their Floods Relief and Early Recovery Response Plan a selection of 29 priority districts. (see table below). Population figures in these selected districts show the proportionally most affected provinces to be Sindh (approximately 18% of the total provincial population), followed by KPK (15%), Balochistan (9%) and Punjab and AJ&K (each 6%).
WHO’s own assessments (via the decentralized hubs in Hyderabad, Sukkur, Multan, Quetta and Peshawar) show a similar geographic distribution of most affected (23) districts as follows:

North Sindh: Jacobabad, Kashmore, Shikarpur, Gotki and Qambar Shahdad Kot

South Sindh: Dadu, Jamshoro and Thatta

Balochistan: Jaffarabad, Nasirabad, Sibi (as potential operations base)

KPK: Nowshera, Charsada, Swat, Kohistan and Shangla

Punjab: Muzaffargarh, DG Khan, Rahim Yar Khan, Layyah, Rajanpur, Bhakkar and Mianwali