CHENGDU, SICHUAN PROVINCE, PRC — 5 million people whose homes were destroyed in last week’s earthquake in soutwest of China, while the confirmed death toll rose to more than 40,000 and the number is still growing.
The State Council raised the overall confirmed death toll to 40,075, most of those in Sichuan province and more than thousands in neiboring provinces in Shaanxi and Gansu. Officials have said the final number killed by the quake is expected to surpass 50,000.
The government was setting up temporary housing for earthquake victims unable to find shelter with relatives, but there was a ‘desperate need for tents’ to accommodate them.
In Beijing, about 300,000 tents had been shipped to the area and 700,000 more ordered, with factories working triple shifts to meet demand.
Another500,000 quilts and 1.7 million jackets were also sent to quake survivors.
Government has said it would accept foreign medical teams, as the relief efforts shifted from searching for survivors to caring for the homeless. A growing number of countries responded to the call, dispatching doctors to the quake area.
Despite generous donations, the disaster is so great that victims still face a challenge in finding living accommodations for people in that area.
A Russian medical team with a mobile hospital arrived Tuesday in the Sichuan provincial capital Chengdu and a 37-member medical team sent by the Taiwan Red Cross organization also arrived in the disaster zone.
Rescue workers resumed the search for bodies on the second day of a three-day national mourning period declared by the Chinese government, an unprecedented gesture to honor the dead.
The situation, and difficulties in the area, including transportation and telecommunications, it is not possible for us to accept all of the rescue and medical teams to engage in relief work.
A crew of volunteers from Tangshan, Hebei Province. The city that suffered the country’s worst quake in 1976 that killed at least 240,000 people, arrived in the quake area.
Because of plans to bury bodies quickly, the government said DNA samples will be taken from corpses to help with later identification. Identified bodies will be cremated, although burial will be allowed where no cremation is possible.
Thousands of quake survivors awoke Tuesday after spending a night sleeping in cars and in the open, frightened by government warnings of a potential strong aftershock.
During the three-day mourning period, flags were flying at half-staff and entertainment events have been canceled. The Olympic torch relay also has been suspended.
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