A week after the flood disaster, the situation in Darna is catastrophic: the authorities fear a cholera outbreak – medicine is still on the way. According to the WHO, around 4,000 dead have been identified.
After the flood, the city of Darna in eastern Libya is threatened with the next catastrophe: the spread of infectious diseases. The first cases of cholera have already been reported. The health minister of the internationally recognized government based in Tripoli called on residents to avoid the wells in the city.
“We have to be clear: there could be contaminated water in every well,” he told Al Jazeera broadcaster. “That’s why we have to take samples now. A team from my ministry is now in Darna and starting its work.” Until the analysis results are available, the groundwater must not be drunk.
“We’re starting from scratch”
In order to prevent epidemics and to make the work of relief teams easier, the most affected areas in the city were cordoned off today. But even a little further from the riverbed, Darna offers a picture of destruction.
Saad al Hassi trudges through the mud in his apartment. His wife was cooking when the water caused a wall and the door to collapse, the 50-year-old told the Reuters news agency.
What’s coming to him now makes him despair. “Only God knows what we’re going through right now. We’re starting from scratch,” he says. “Nobody is helping us, and the government hasn’t helped either.” He and his wife were left on the street: “Fortunately, we Libyans are a united people. From Tripoli, from Misrata, from the south, from everywhere they came to help.”
Caring for survivors remains difficult
Trucks with food now arrive regularly in Darna. It is often the Libyan scouts who distribute bags of rice and canned goods. More help is on the way. In Benghazi, 300 kilometers away, 29 tons of medical supplies arrived today. These include vital medicines for chronic and communicable diseases. This means that almost 250,000 people can be supplied, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
However, there is only one functioning road over the mountains from Benghazi to Darna – so caring for the survivors remains difficult.
Aid organizations reported that the coordination of aid was sometimes chaotic. The government in the east of the country has hardly set up any structures that would be necessary in a situation like the current one.
Curfew became a trap
The anger of many Libyans over the authorities’ failures is becoming increasingly louder. The complaints are so loud that politicians and the judiciary have to react. The investigation has begun, Attorney General Al-Seddik Assur announced yesterday evening: “We will hold the local authorities and the responsible governments accountable for any negligence and carelessness.” The Attorney General’s Office will take decisive action, which it will announce in due course.
There were failures in the run-up to and on the day of the flood itself. The dams above the city were not maintained for years. And when storm “Daniel” approached last weekend, the residents of Darna were warned, but the authorities also declared a curfew. In retrospect, this turned out to be fatal: when the dams burst, the call to stay at home became a death trap for many of the city’s residents.