Disease, Lack Of Food Imperil Storm Victims

Threats of starvation and disease hung over victims of Hurricane Pauline on Saturday as workers struggled to rebuild washed out roads and reach thousands of hungry villagers.

Nearly 20,000 people in Oaxaca state, southeast of Acapulco, remain isolated by storm damage, state Health Secretary Miguel Angel Colmenares told the newspaper La Jornada in Saturday’s editions.

Helicopters had been flying in small amounts of food and water, but dense fog and rain since late Thursday have prevented further flights. Many communities report going for up to five days without food.

The Televisa television network on Friday reported the death of a 4-month-old child from hunger in the Oaxacan coffee-producing village of Pluma Hidalgo, but that report could not be independently confirmed.

Hurricane Pauline plowed past Mexico’s Pacific coast Oct. 8-9, leaving at least 240 people dead in three states and 300,000 homeless - mostly in Oaxaca.

For the third time since the hurricane struck, President Ernesto Zedillo visited Acapulco, warning on Saturday that people may soon begin starving to death in Oaxaca.

As he walked past open sewers, flooded streets and houses filled with sand in the nearby community of Puerto Marquez, Zedillo said the government was working on an emergency footing to get food to the isolated mountain communities.

“In Oaxaca, we have the risk that people could die of hunger if we don’t act,” Zedillo said.

While millions of gallons of water have been rushed to Acapulco, one of Mexico’s most important tourist centers, towns farther down the coast such as Puerto Escondido still lack water, La Jornada reported.

In Acapulco, broken water systems and flooded sewer drains have raised the specter of epidemics.

Three new cholera cases were detected here, raising the number of confirmed cases here to 13, Health Secretary Juan Ramon de la Fuente said. More cases have been reported in Oaxaca, but the greater problem there is dengue, a sometimes painful mosquito-born fever, he said.

To avoid an epidemic, health workers are going house to house checking on residents and offering advice on how to avoid infection. In addition, hundreds of people have been quarantined for every confirmed case, De la Fuente said.