Update on Red Cross response in Nepal

The Canadian Red Cross has deployed its mobile field hospital and 25 aid workers to Nepal. The mobile hospital will help alleviate the strain on the local healthcare system. It's part of a coordinated response by the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement to the powerful earthquake that shook the Kathmandu region.

More than a dozen Red Cross societies from around the world have also mobilized support, including water and sanitation, shelter, relief supplies, communications, logistics and other elements that are critical in a large-scale humanitarian response. Nepal Red Cross Society volunteers and staff began providing aid immediately after the earthquake struck.

Photo credit: Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development

In many areas outside the Kathmandu Valley, the condition of many people remains unknown. Six Red Cross assessment teams are reporting that some towns and villages in the worst-affected districts close to the epicentre have suffered almost total devastation. Local residents are in a desperate situation.

“One of our teams that returned from Chautara in Sindupalchowk district reported that 90 per cent of the homes are destroyed. The hospital has collapsed, and people are digging through the rubble with their hands in the hope that they might find family members who are still alive,” said Jagan Chapagain, Director of Asia Pacific with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. “We can expect the situation to be the same if not worse in many other places where aid has not yet been delivered.”

There are estimates that up to 40,000 homes in Sindupalchowk alone have been destroyed.

With so many families in need, the Nepal Red Cross Society has almost exhausted its relief stocks which were sufficient for 19,000 families. Every day, Red Cross volunteers have been distributing tarpaulins in affected areas, to shelter thousands of people who remain too afraid to return home because of aftershocks and damage to their homes.

The priority now is to move relief efforts to more remote areas.

“We know what the needs are, and Nepal Red Cross volunteers are ready in every district to distribute relief. The challenge now is bringing sufficient quantities into the country,” explained Chapagain.

The amount of emergency aid needed for such a large-scale disaster outstrips the capacity of Kathmandu’s small international airport, which is receiving an extremely high volume of aid flights now coming into Nepal.
The Canadian government announced this week that it will be matching eligible donations from April 25 to May 25.