New Delhi: World Health Organization warned on Tuesday that up to 23 million people could be affected by the massive earthquake that has killed thousands in Turkey and Syria.
Adelheid Marschang, WHO Senior Emergency Officer, said that some 23 million people, including 1.4 million children, were likely to be exposed in both countries following the earthquake and its aftershocks that reduced thousands of buildings to rubble.
"Event overview maps show that potentially 23 million people are exposed, including around five million vulnerable populations," she told the UN health agency's executive committee.
She stated that Turkey had a strong capacity to respond to the crisis but that the main unmet needs in the immediate and mid-term would be across the border in Syria, already grappling with a years-long humanitarian crisis due to the civil war and a cholera outbreak.
The death toll from the five consecutive earthquakes that struck Turkey and Syria in the last 48 hours rose above 5,000, official data showed, with search and rescue operations still continuing.
"This is a crisis on top of multiple crises in the affected region," she said. "All over Syria, the needs are the highest after nearly 12 years of protracted, complex crisis, while humanitarian funding continues to decline."
"It's now a race against time," said WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. "Every minute, every hour that passes, the chances of finding survivors alive diminishes."
He said the WHO was especially concerned about areas of Turkey and Syria where no information had emerged since Monday's earthquake.
"Damage mapping is one way to understand where we need to focus our attention," he said.
WHO said it was dispatching emergency supplies, including trauma and emergency surgical kits, and activating a network of emergency medical teams.
"To our sisters and brothers from Turkey and Syria, we all stand with you in this moment of unspeakable grief," said WHO Director General Tedros, adding, "This is a moment when we must come together in solidarity, as one humanity, to save lives and alleviate the suffering of people who have already suffered so much."