Typhoon Yolanda And A Call For A New Focus In Disaster Planning
It is now a week since Typhoon Yolanda struck and decimated parts of the Philippines with a savagery unequaled in history. At this time over 3000 people have been confirmed dead, 12,000 injured and hundreds of thousands now in conditions so miserable that some have voiced envy for those that have died. Food and clean water are practically non-existent in many towns. There are no medical services. People have been forced to shelter in the open air amid piles of rubble and the decaying bodies of their loved ones scattered nearby. Such are the images and stories we have received just from the city of Tacloban, one of the many areas that bore the brunt of Yolanda's savage winds and accompanying storm tide. One could imagine that if the citizens of Tacloban receiving worldwide, 24 hour attention are in such dire straights what could be the situation in the the hundreds of towns and villages also devastated by the storm but unheard of up to now? It is in my ...