Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Tegucigalpa (Agenzia Fides) – The natural disaster that has been affecting the people of Honduras for the last few days has already caused the deaths of over 25 people and left hundreds of homes destroyed and 24,000 damaged. As of right now, there are about 200,000 people affected and 70% of the roadways have been damaged, leading the government to declare a state of emergency. The Pastoral/Social association of Caritas of Honduras is now evaluating the general damages, trying to be more efficient in offering aid and assistance to the evacuees in various local villages.
In the northern part of the country, constant rain and the rupture of the flood-barriers has led to flooding in the cities of Choloma, La Lima, and Puerto Cortes, worsening the situations in Pimienta and Potrerillos. As the government organizations and the Red Cross work on evacuation efforts, Caritas reports that over 8,000 people were affected in this northern region. Right now, local organizations are trying to work together to meet the most urgent needs, in this case: canned goods, blankets, water, and medicine for respiratory, skin, and stomach illnesses.
Several communities of the Diocese of Trujillo continue to be inaccessible and in urgent need for aid. On November 1, Caritas of Trujillo distributed 200 food rations, however it could not reach the areas affected because there is no ground access. The constant rains that fall night and day, as a result of the first cold front that has hit the country, have left the communities in the region of Colon, one of the areas most heavily affected by the rains, inaccessible.
Caritas of Trujillo held a meeting with members of the Emergency Committee of Tocoa and several local NGOs in order to coordinate the distribution of humanitarian aid to the communities of Tocoa, who are still inaccessible and in urgent need of aid.
The rainy season that affects Honduras from May to November has already led to the deaths of 51 people, official statistics say. Faced with this problem that affects the country every year, Caritas Honduras developed an Institutional Policy for Communal Management to Reduce Disaster Risk, whose primary goal is to reduce the risk of the population in facing these adversities. The environment is also one of the main concerns of Caritas in the region of Latin America and the Caribbean, as from a human development perspective, the environmental emergencies cause economic and social damages to the infrastructure, as ell as changes in social, economic, and political priorities, and negative redistribution and imbalances in income. (RG) (Agenzia Fides 3/11/2008)
