Pakistan Flooding

PAKISTAN FLOOD CRISIS

BY MIA HOOPER

The devastating flooding in Pakistan has displaced millions and will take months to recede, increasing the risk of contracting waterborne diseases. There are multiple reasons which can be related to the cause of this destructive occurrence. Many speculate that due to rising temperatures, the melting glaciers and rain have become more intense. Others believe it is just the monsoon season coming and going. The most important aspect of this devastating event is that more than 33 million people have been forcefully relocated, with many even killed.

Hundreds of villages across much of Pakistan’s fertile land have been inundated. It has become so severe where what was once farmland, has become two large lakes in Sindh Province in the southern region. If these villages were not completely submerged, they were turned into fragile islands. This intense amount of water will take months to recede and the damage that has been done will take triple that to repair. Due to the abnormal amount of water, swarms of mosquitos have become attracted to the stagnant water. The damage done to power lines has caused them to dangle close to the surface of the water.

The Pakistani people have been repeatedly told to vacate the isolated villages, but the villagers are persistent. They must stay to protect their livestock as well as their refrigerators and tin roof from petty thieves. Along with this, the cost to rent a boat and transport one family and their belongings is unreasonably high. Diseases such as malaria, dengue fever, and waterborne diseases are uncontrollable and spreading at an alarming rate. Hundreds and thousands of patients are suffering of dengue due to the outbreak where cases this year are fifty percent high than last year.